LOOKING TOWARDS THE GENERAL ELECTION

With the general election coming up next year many organisations are publishing their own manifestos. Here are three of them:

1. The Institute of Rural Health has launched a rural health manifesto -http://www.rural-health.ac.uk/pdfs/Manifesto2009.pdf  The Manifesto sets out the priorities that the Institute of Rural health believes should be addressed by policy makers includi9ng tackling inequality and disadvantage, rural proofing, porviding appropriate care locally, amd access to health services for rural people.

2. The Carnegie Commission rural manifesto can be accessed via: http://www.carnegieuktrust.org.uk/news_and_events/carnegie_uk_trust_launches_a_manifesto_for_rural_communities1
The Manifesto draws upon strong evidence from real places that community action really makes a difference to people’s lives. The Manifesto suggests that dynamic, vibrant and sustainable communities need creative people working together, assets to support their aspirations and agencies and local people collaborating to an agreed plan. The Manifesto then explores in detail ten characteristics of the resilient community of the future.

3. The Rural Coalition includes ACRE, CPRE, CLA, LGA, Town and Country Planning Association and the Royal Town Planning Institute, is chaired by Matthew Taylor MP.  The rural coalition argues that the future of rural England can only be secured if local rural communities take on the challenge of securing a more sustainable future for themselves and national policies, particularly on planning, provide the appropriate context for this to happen. The prospectus can be downloaded from: http://www.rsnonline.org.uk/images/files/ruralcoalitionprospectus.pdf as the colalition's own website is still not live.

___________________posted dec 7th 2009 ________________________