A thousand community assets protected in listings bonanza
27 May 2014 11:37 AM
Stephen Williams pays tribute to communities
that have used new powers to protect around 1,200 local
assets.
With millions of people using the bank holiday weekend
to enjoy public facilities in their area, Minister for Communities Stephen
Williams yesterday (26 May 2014) pays tribute to all communities that have used
new powers to protect around 1,200 local assets from sell off across
England.
The
fast growing list of treasured community assets now protected
includes:
- 374
pubs
- 91
parks
- 37
libraries
- 35
village halls
- 24
sports grounds and stadiums
- 12
theatres and museums
One
of the most recent uses of community rights was by the Friends of
Blencathra who have taken the unusual step of applying to list the
Blencathra peak in Cumbria, England’s eighth highest mountain to protect
it from being sold.
Stephen Williams said:
Unlike past governments who thought they always knew
best, we have said we want to put the real experts in charge of running their
community: local people.
We
created new community rights precisely to allow people to list the local assets
most important to them so they are publicly protected should they ever be put
up for sale.
It
is fantastic to see the ingenuity and enthusiasm that people are displaying for
their community with over 1,000 parks and buildings now listed, and that number
is growing fast.
Under powers created by this government people can put
forward a community asset to their council to have it listed as a protected
asset and, if approved, this gives a 6 month window for the community to put in
a bid to buy it should it be put up for sale.
For
examples of listed assets see the winners from a £5 million fund to support 17 community assets
listings.
A
further £3 million fund is currently open for bids.
Across the country over 2 million people have used or
benefited from these new powers to run their community. As well as giving
people the power to list local assets the government is:
-
encouraging local people to decide where development
takes place and what it looks like in their area, with over 1,000 areas
beginning work on neighbourhood plans
-
making it quicker to create parish councils with 17
campaigns for new parishes having received government funding, and changes
coming to the rules to make it easier to start the parish council creation
process too; newly created Queen’s Park parish in West London has just
had its first election
-
enabling people to raise money through community shares
to take over local assets; over 15,000 people invested £15 million last
year in shares in community enterprises, including £500,000 to help save
Hastings Pier, and 27 pubs are now co-operatively owned with an average of 1
pub a month opening as a cooperative
-
getting over 120 areas enrolled on the ‘Our
Place’ programme to bring together communities, voluntary
organisations, businesses, public services and elected officials to tackle
local issues
Further information
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