by Paul Strohm
Dr Rod Hackney, “community” architect and Prince Charles’ architectural confidant, has called for drastic measures to curb inner city decay, and believes the professions and the private sector must investigate social deprivation, bad housing and unemployment as “a top priority”.
Addressing a Tory Reform Group conference, Winning the third term, held at Somerville College, Oxford, Dr Hackney also jumped on the Band Aid bandwagon by telling his audience that new measures should include a Bob Geldofstyle fund for the inner-city needy.
This could be used by the voluntary, private and public sectors to set up “street-corner projects and provide surgeries for the repair of social, economic and environmental conditions”.
He also said that architectural aid — free architectural advice — can be justified far more easily than legal aid, “the only drawback being that we do not have the backing of the most powerful lobby in the country”.
Rules and regulations need to be relaxed. In particular, planning regulations need to be overhauled to do away with current zoning policy,” he added.
And he said that just because an area is zoned for housing, it should not be stopped having small businesses, workshops, advisory centres and offices for “inner city professionals”.
He said, though, that problems must be tackled locally and that those involved should work from offices in the streets where they are acting. “Only by tackling problems at grass roots level will they be solved.”
Banks, building societies, investment and pension funds also came under fire, and Dr Hackney argued that they should be encouraged to stop red-lining.
“With so many people on the dole,” he said, “building societies and banks should consider the dole as income in giving mortgages. Dole money is collateral like any other, and some building societies are already responding.”
