Bristol is one of the most liveable cities in the UK. However, in common with many major cities in the UK, Bristol has a housing crisis. Over 2,000 new homes are required each year to address the housing waiting list and provide a permanent home to those living in temporary accommodation. Given the social needs of the city, 40% of new homes will need to be affordable. By increasing the stock and availability of high-quality housing, Bristol can address a key structural barrier to health equality, inclusive growth and environmental sustainability.
To enable housing innovation for inclusive growth, and to enable a fair and inclusive recovery from the pandemic, requires our measures of success to be inclusive too. As a city, we must be prepared to update the way we think about success to include both people and planet alongside profit. The UK Government have already begun to recognise this need (before Covid 19) through the Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012 requiring ‘people who commission public services to think about how they can also secure wider social, economic and environmental benefits’.
Bristol City Council’s published Social Value Policy responds to the legal obligation upon local authorities and other public bodies under the Public Services (Social Value) Act 2012 to consider the social good that could come from the procurement of services, before they embark upon it. This legislation, and Bristol City Council’s policy gives us an opportunity to build into procurement the wisdom of longer-term decision making, addressing issues such as the quality and the sustainability of our housing in a way that the traditional prioritisation of cost as the principal benchmark makes difficult.
Fanyu Lin, founder of World Home Foundation, is an award-winning entrepreneur and architect, passionate about impact investing. She initiated the World Home Foundation in 2020 to harness philanthropic power for tackling the global housing crisis - one of the biggest social, economic and moral challenges facing humanity today.