The chief executive of the National Lottery Community Fund (NLCF) has called on the government to give more power to local communities and civil society ahead of the next prime minister beginning their term in office.
Speaking yesterday at an event in Westminster on devolution, David Knott welcomed “the instinct to move power away from Westminster”, possibly referring to Andy Burnham’s recently announced plans to devolve power to the regions if he becomes prime minister.
But Knott said the government must “make sure that decision-making and planning power travels well beyond institutions and reaches directly into neighbourhoods, networks and civil society”.
Knott vowed that the NLCF would play “a different, bigger role” about “fixing the problem with our current funding model” in order to be “much more than a funder and grantmaker”.
He said that the community funder was intending to work with civil society along with local government, business and philanthropy to ensure that “the full assets of communities and places can be brought to bear”.
Knott welcomed the government’s recently launched public consultation on National Lottery funding for good causes, saying that “when it comes to serious reform, we’re all in”.
He said NLCF would be using knowledge from local communities when making national decisions.
Citing the lottery-funded Better Start programme, Knott said: “Its lesson is prevention works best when parents are listened to and services work together with them over the long term and on a national scale.
“That is the kind of local learning we need to join together, lift up, and drop into policy, which means us bringing more communities, grant holders, universities, funders, public services, businesses and civil society together.”
He also called on civil society organisations to “keep organising, collaborating and challenging us” and to “hold us to the ambitions we have set for ourselves today”.
