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Principles met

  • Co-production

    We will develop systems that enable citizens to be equal partners in designing and commissioning public services and in determining the use of public resources.

  • Community leadership and a new role for councillors

    We will explore ways for councils to act as a platform for helping the community to contribute to local outcomes, and to re-think the role of councillors as community connectors, brokers and leaders.

  • Enterprise and social economy

    We will promote community-based approaches to economic development that focus on supporting the creation of jobs, social enterprises and other businesses and providing an environment for co-operative and mutual enterprises to thrive.

  • Innovation

    We will embrace innovation in how we work with local communities to drive positive change.

  • Learning

    We will capture and ‘expand’ the experience and learning from individual projects and approaches in order to encourage broader application of co-operative principles within individual member Councils and across the Network.

  • Maximising social value

    We will support the development of a framework and criteria for social value, giving substance to the concept and supporting Councils with the tools to ensure better local social and economic outcomes.

  • Walking the talk

    As a membership organisation, we will make this statement of our principles operational by: • Co-operation among members: Our members work together to help each other implement our values, sharing experiences and learning. • Openness of membership: Full, Associate and Affiliate Membership is open to any qualifying Council, organisation or individual who shares our values and is committed to putting them into action. • Co-production of the Network’s work: Members help shape the Network’s work programme and the content of events and written products. • Action-focused: The network is a vehicle for helping councils translate co-operative values and principles into policy and practice. •Membership-based: The network is majority funded by modest membership subscriptions from its member Councils, Associates and Affiliates. •Non-party-political: Members share the belief that working co-operatively within and across communities holds the key to tackling today’s challenges.

Developing our collaborative approach

Tackling poverty has been a priority since 2018, alongside shaping a more inclusive economy. Before the pandemic, we were already concerned about the ways that the benefits system, housing costs and low wages had driven up levels of poverty and specifically in-work poverty. Despite visible affluence, we estimate that a third of Hackney households and half of children are in poverty, after housing costs, and that groups that experience structural inequality are more likely to be in poverty,

By 2020 we were developing a more co-ordinated approach to tackling poverty. During the pandemic we built on this approach, recognising, unfortunately, that we expected people to be in a worse financial position coming out of the pandemic and we would need to ensure support was still in place. Collaboration continues to be at the heart of this approach.

Framing the issues the right way

Hackney adopted a Poverty Reduction Framework in March 2022. The causes and effects of poverty are varied and complex. No single service or organisation can tackle the scale of the challenge or reach the diversity of people struggling.

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