and  in Urban Studies have gained external support from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation for a project on Serving Deprived Communities in a Recession: assessing the impact of local government contraction on vulnerable people and deprived places, which will run from May 2012 to March 2014. It is led from Glasgow in collaboration with Prof Glen Bamley from Heriot Watt.

The overall aim of this project is to establish the consequences of the contraction in local authority income and expenditure after June 2010 for vulnerable people and deprived places. 

Specific objectives are:

  • To provide a national picture of the distribution of public spending cuts as these affect local government services from 2010/11 to 2012/13.
  • To conduct in-depth research within selected case study authorities capable of:
    - understanding the approaches taken to managing budget contraction and the pattern of changes to service provision arising from this; 
    - identifying how these changes impact on vulnerable residents and deprived neighbourhoods.
  • To enhance the capacity of local government to assess the impact of the spending cuts.
  • To provide policy and practice recommendations to central and local government on ways of limiting adverse impacts on the most deprived or vulnerable, both as the research proceeds and at its completion.

Methods include analysis of national level budget data and in depth case studies in three English and one Scottish local authorities. Anyone with an interest in the research can contact Annette or Nick.

In addition, Annette has been successful as a co-applicant for an AHRC's Connected Communities knowledge exchange project to fund a seminar series and networking/dissemination that aims to translate the findings of four of the projects funded in the initial call in this programme for policy audiences. The theme is Reframing Citizen Relationships with the Public Sector in a Time of Austerity: Community Empowerment in England and Scotland. It is led by colleagues in Geography at Durham University and is a collaboration between five universities and has the support of Scottish Government, plus a range of third sector organizations.

First published: 27 January 2012

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