Part 1. Worried about...

WORRIED ABOUT:

NO LOCAL JOBS OR BUSINESSES?
NO AFFORDABLE HOUSING?
YOUR POST OFFICE CLOSING?
NO LOCAL POLICE STATION?
LOCAL SHOPS AND PUBS CLOSING?
TRAFFIC WRECKING QUIET STREETS?
POLLUTION AND CLIMATE CHANGE?
LACK OF LOCAL HEALTHY FOOD?
NO BUSES / OLDER PEOPLE ABANDONED?
DOCTORS, DENTISTS & HOLSPITALS CLOSING?

NOW YOU CAN FIGHT BACK!

A new law gives you, your neighbours and friends power to tell Government how to help you stop your community declining.

The 3 MPs, David Drew (Labour), Nick Hurd (Conservative) and Julia Goldsworthy (Lib Dem) that lead the cross party campaign for the Act in Parliament have said:

“This is not just another consultation. This Act gives you power to protect and enhance your community, we urge you to use it.”

On 23 October 2007 the Sustainable Communities Act became law. It is a remarkable piece of legislation: for the first time we have an Act of Parliament that discards the usual top-down decision making and also the nonsense that ‘consultation’ by the government is somehow empowering (when the opposite is the case as most people know).

This Act is special because it establishes for the first time a co-operative method of decision making, so that all the decisions are no longer made at the centre.

It is an Act that can empower citizens and will give effect to what the sponsors argued for the 5 years of the campaign that:

‘citizens and councils are the experts on their own problems and the solutions to them’

It is, as Government Minister Phil Woolas told the House of Commons on 15 June 2007 one of the most important such Acts in the last 40 years because as he said: ‘I genuinely believe that it will change the relationships in British politics’.

The Act gives you power over decisions which affect your life.
This guide explains how it can help you fight back against the problems stated above!

other parts:
Part 2. Sounds too good to be true
Part 3. So how can this Act help us?
Part 4. From Ideas to Action
Part 5. Why should councils get involved?