Previous News: Sheffield shows its steel for regeneration

The team from Creating Excellence took our stand along and talked to many of the 500 plus delegates about the work that is being undertaken in the South West to help with regeneration and renewal. We also gave out information about the other Regional Centres so that people could find out what is going on in their region.

There were a number of excellent plenary sessions and workshops which the team attended.

We have collated some of the information that most interested us below:

1) Professor Suzanne Fitzpatrick (Joseph Rowntree Professor of Housing Policy, York University) discussed recent research findings around 'The Importance of Place': specifically:

1. Is there poverty of place
2. Why does it matter?
3. What can be done?

Concentrating on two of the most deprived cities in the UK (Liverpool and Glasgow or the 'Northern Clusters') the study, maybe unsurprisingly, revealed that it was actually worse to be poor in a poor place, with the notion of residents simply having no choice but to "get by and get on".

Why did this matter? Because of the independent negative effect in places of poverty: e.g. negative attitudes towards education and skills; social processes such as 1) the stigma; 2) conflict and crime. However, on a positive note, these places also tend to have complex social networks in place offering huge community support and therefore huge social capital potential.

In conclusion, we can all draw from this that new planning efforts (i.e. section 106) to pepper-pot or mix social groups (new communities of place) will have to tread very carefully to not simply create a new chapter of 'poverty of place' but instead, work thoughtfully and creatively with this un-tapped social capital to create strong vibrant communities.

2) The need for connections. What better an example than 'Lessons from Northern Ireland' Jackie Redpath (Chief Executive of Greater Shankill Partnership and Geraldine McAteer, (Chief Exec, West Belfast Partnership) delivered the message loud and clear that the main ingredients for bringing segregated or divided communities together was to have a common agenda. This common agenda had to be stronger than the differences dividing the communities in the first place to be successful. The agenda has to have common social and economic goals and you have to be prepared for on-going (and at times, extremely turbulent) community and government engagement.

3) Creating a can-do culture: Dr. Carol Craig (Chief Executive, Centre for Confidence and Well-Being, Glasgow).

The Centre's mission is to help bring about a transformation in Scottish culture so that it supports more

• Positive attitudes
• Confidence
• Individuality
• Creativity and innovation
• Recognition of success
• Well-being

The big thing is confidence and the difference between 'individualism' and 'individuality' (Individualism being about the rights of the individual and individuality being about using our own distinctive character to achieve things.)

Confidence for individuals to help relationship building, developing better attitudes towards our rapidly changing world and confidence affecting organisations and countries even!

She outlined that, for a variety of reasons, Scottish culture is not good at instilling confidence in its people. This is partly due to Scotland's relationship with England but it also results from Scottish indigenous values which frequently act to undermine, rather than support, individual self-confidence.

For more information visit the centre's web site at www.centreforconfidence.co.uk