The last cycle of the NLA Planning Expert Panel concluded with the Panel producing a white paper which contributed to the New London Agenda. The white paper focused on the following themes: the proper functioning of the planning system; embedding social value through all phases of planning and development processes; and effective community engagement in planning.

 

A refreshed Panel met on March 18, 2024, for the first meeting of this next cycle. We started with introductions and the welcoming of new members. We touched on the white paper and the New London Agenda. We then had a sector briefing by Carl Konadu and Azzees Minott of 2-3 Degrees, a social enterprise that aims to inspire and equip young people with the personal development skills needed to fulfil their potential.

 

The sector briefing looked at the work of 2-3 Degrees and included a run-through of several case studies, focusing on positive ways in which youth and young people have been involved in planning and the built environment. 2-3 Degrees provided their thoughts on key learnings. These highlighted the need to ensure that any initiatives avoid a tokenistic approach and treating young people as a must have, rather than a nice to have, in the planning engagement process.

 

A roundtable discussion then took place. This was able to draw from the learnings provided by 2-3 Degrees and sought to identify key topics that the Panel could focus on through the remainder of the year.

 

Key points / highlights from the roundtable discussion included:

 

 

In the context of the above, and seen as crucial strands to ensure the New London Agenda is being implemented with diversity, social value and youth engagement at its core, the Panel will now form three sub-groups to explore the following (one topic per sub-group):

 

 

Each sub-group has been set the task of undertaking a research piece through 2024 and presenting its findings at the end of the year. A short brief has been provided to Panel members in this respect and proposes that the research covers four key areas, for each of the above topics:

 

 

The above will be provided as a presentation at the end of the year, together with a 500-word summary of findings. These will then be compiled into ‘white paper’ format as a record of the Panel’s work.