News & Events

Community Empowerment White Paper

The long awaited Community Empowerment White Paper has been published.

The paper, entitled Communities in control; Real People, real power is the Governments' attempt to pass power into the hands of local communities.

The White Paper sets out a vision for strengthening representative democracy through participative democracy. Main points in the White Paper include:

  • a new duty on councils to promote democracy.   
  • a range of measures to increase visibility and accountability in local services.   
  • a review of redress in council services for when things go wrong. 
  • support for councils at the community level, such as parish councils, and will introduce a new right for local people to appeal to the Secretary of State if their council denies them the opportunity to establish a community council.
  • extension of the ‘duty to involve’ across a range of public agencies and bodies, so that publicly-funded bodies must do more to engage with the public they serve
  • the launch a £70 million Communitybuilders scheme to support community organisations.  
  • the removal of some of the barriers for faith-based organisations to supply goods and services to local authorities.

The White Paper also announces a £7.5 million Empowerment Fund for national third sector organisations.  This Fund covers areas such as innovative schemes for young people who would otherwise not have the opportunity to gain community leadership skills, involvement in planning and social enterprise.

Download the White Paper here (Note: 2MB file) - Communities in Control

Created on July 11th 2008

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