MD2818 Good Growth by Design and Mayor’s Design Advocates

1.1. Good Growth by Design (GGbD) is the Mayor’s programme to promote quality and inclusion in the built environment to support Good Growth. It recognises the role of design in improving development and delivering quality of life in an ever-denser city.



1.2. The programme has provided policy development and guidance on critical issues facing our built environment. It has established robust processes to promote quality and advocated more broadly for a built environment for all Londoners. Most recently, the programme has convened a series of Recovery Roundtables, with Mayor’s Design Advocates (MDAs) and other external experts, providing insights and intelligence into how the built environment has impacted individuals’ and communities’ experience of the COVID-19 pandemic and the role it can have in the capital’s recovery, informing the wider Recovery programme.

1.3. To date, the programme has been supported by 52 MDAs and six Advocate Organisations (see Appendix A). MDAs are independent and impartial built environment experts, who provide support, advice, critique and expertise on London’s built environment. The group includes practitioners, academics, policy makers and those from community-led schemes. 50% are women, and one in four are from ethnic minority backgrounds. Advocate Organisations are a range of built environment sector facing organisations that provide thought leadership and are an important means of dissemination to the sector.

1.4. GGbD covers six pillars of activity:

1. Setting Standards

Using design inquiries to investigate key issues for architecture, urban design and place-shaping, to set clear policies and standards.

2. Applying the Standards

Ensuring effective design review across London, including a London Design Review Panel.

3. Building Capacity

Enhancing the GLA Group’s and boroughs’ ability to shape new development to deliver good growth.

4. Supporting Diversity

Working towards a more representative sector and striving for best practice while designing for diversity.

5. Commissioning Quality

Ensuring excellence in how the Mayor and other public sector clients appoint and manage architects and other built environment professionals.

6. Championing Good Growth by Design

Advocating best practice to support success across the sector.

1.5. The programme supports all built environment related teams across the GLA Group, including Planning, Regeneration and Economic Development, Culture, Housing and Land, Environment, Communities and Social Policy, Education and Youth, and teams within LLDC, OPDC and TfL (most notably TfL Commercial and TfL Investment Delivery Planning). Engagement with the programme has typically been through:

• collaboration on design research and policy development, where a GLA team sets requirements and the GGbD team lead research with an MDA Sounding Board and oversee the production of guidance; and

• GLA Group teams’ use of the GGbD London Review Panel (LRP) to undertake design review for projects where the Mayor is providing investment, taking planning decisions or setting new guidance and policy.

1.6. The GGbD programme adds value to policy development and design guidance through a robust methodology that includes MDA and external expert involvement, through the development of quality outputs which are systemically structured by ‘principles’ and ‘practices’ and which focus on usability through a strong graphic approach, and through launch activities that invite feedback and scrutiny from the industry. As a result, GGbD outputs have good traction and are well regarded by the industry, both public and private sector.

1.7. The GGbD programme’s overview and core budget were approved under cover of Director Decision (DD) 2105 and further budget allocations to support design review were approved under DD2514. As such the following confirmed budgets are available for the programme, with further match funding and income through planning fees in relation to external London Review Panel use anticipated.

1.8. Core budget will be allocated to support policy development and design research commissions, to support associated events and to cover London Review Panel costs. The Skills for Londoners and Good Growth Fund budgets will be allocated to support London Review Panel services and other design quality measures specific to the funding programmes’ respective projects. Additional match funding is anticipated, including through Recovery-linked activity such as the High Streets Challenge Fund, the Future Neighbourhoods 2030 Fund and the Green and Resilient Spaces Fund (decision forthcoming). Additional match funding will support recovery-linked project delivery through funding an expert panel that will provide enabling support to recipients and ensure that projects meet design quality requirements and Good Growth and mission objectives.

1.9. The current cohort of Mayors Design Advocates’ appointments will expire in September 2021. This will allow the procurement of a new cohort of MDAs with skills and expertise in alignment with Mayoral priorities and with the Recovery Programme and associated missions. MDAs will be appointed through a competitive and open process through the TfL eTendering system, ‘ProContract’. Appointments will be made based on skills and expertise needs set out by relevant GLA Group teams and policy leads. The open call will highlight the ambition for a panel make-up that is reflective of London’s population in terms of gender and ethnicity and will seek representation across a range of protected characteristic groups. GLA Group teams will be engaged in the procurement and assessment process.



1.10. Alongside the re-procurement of Mayor’s Design Advocates, there is also an opportunity to refresh the pool of Advocate Organisations. Advocate Organisations are built environment bodies through whom the programme can disseminate messages and engage across the sector. The current pool (Architects for Change, Future of London, London Festival of Architecture, New London Architecture, Public Practice and Urban Design London) represent key bodies across London and are generally well-established and wide-reaching. The Advocate Organisation relationship is non-contractual and does not have financial implications. Existing Advocate Organisations will be maintained, but subject to demand and the evolution of the programme, further Advocate Organisations may be added through invited applications from relevant bodies.

2.1. The overarching objective of the Good Growth by Design programme is to provide skills, tools and resources to support quality and inclusion in the built environment, deliver Good Growth and support the London Recovery programme. While structurally the programme will retain the established programme pillars, thematically the programme will focus on new term priorities of the Green New Deal, jobs and employment and young Londoners.

2.2. The GGbD programme will play a key role in supporting the London Recovery programme and the nine recovery missions, particularly those to which the built environment is most relevant. An expert panel, comprising Mayor’s Design Advocates and other external experts, will be established to support mission delivery. Individual projects developed through the missions will benefit from expert panel enabling support and be subject to design review through the London Review Panel. In addition, guidance will be developed with mission support in mind.

2.3. The following sets out, by programme pillar, the proposed objectives, activities and outcomes.

2.3.1. Setting Standards

Proposed activities:

- The GGbD programme team will engage with policy and recovery mission leads on policy requirements to set out research and guidance priorities which would benefit from built environment expertise and support a focus on the Green New Deal, young Londoners and jobs and employment.

- Advocate Organisations will test and develop these research and guidance outputs.

- The programme team will develop a support offer to recovery missions, including through access to the expert panel with MDAs.

Expected outputs:

- Six new pieces of GGbD guidance over the Mayoral term.

- The establishment of the experts’ panel to support mission delivery.

2.3.2. Applying standards

Proposed activities:

- The GGbD programme team will continue emphasis on the roll-out of the London Review Panel across the GLA Group. This will continue to support Planning team referred cases and Opportunity Area Planning Frameworks (OAPFs), in line with agreed Planning Team protocols, provide continued support to TfL Commercial’s three stage review protocol and develop a bespoke workshop offer for Make London recipients.

- The GGbD programme team will work with Housing and Land colleagues to embed design review requirements in any new Affordable Homes Programme funding criteria and design management plans.

- There will be continued engagement in the London-wide, Urban Design London (UDL) led design review forum and input into its overview website.

Expected outputs and outcomes:

- Delivery of one hundred and twenty design reviews of Mayoral schemes across the Mayoral term, including a minimum of twelve Planning referred cases.

- Establishment of a London Review Panel Annual report, available on the london.gov.uk website.

2.3.3. Building capacity

Proposed activities:

- Working with Public Practice, the GGbD team will identify the skills requirements of local authorities and sub-regional partnerships to support a new recovery-focused Public Practice cohort, enabled by borough match funding. The Mayor, with the support of the London Economic Action Partnership, is making match funding available for recovery focused roles for a 12-month period.

- The programme will continue to influence the programme of Urban Design London, as an Advocate Organisation and key provider of training to the public sector in London.

- The programme will undertake the biennial Placeshaping Capacity Survey, which since 2014 has gathered important information on London’s public sector capacity to deliver Good Growth, informing our programmes.

Expected outputs and outcomes:

- Ten Public Practice placements to support recovery.

- Placemaking capacity and design review survey results report.

2.3.4. Supporting diversity

Proposed activities:

- The GGbD team will develop an Architecture Practice mentoring programme. Building on experience with the Architecture and Urbanism Framework and learning from MDA experience and relevant ongoing initiatives, the programme will grow the capacity and professional networks of practitioners and practices led by people from underrepresented groups, helping them to play a more active role in designing and shaping projects in London.

- We will continue to convene a professional institutes roundtable bringing together six key professional bodies (RIBA, RTPI, Landscape Institute, ICE, RICS and CIOB) covering the built environment. Responding to sector level commitments set out in the GGbD Supporting Diversity Handbook, three working groups have been established to consider data, training and intersectionality.

- The programme will provide MDA support to the Commission for Diversity in the Public Realm.

Expected outputs and outcomes:

- Four meetings of the Professional Institutes Roundtable per annum and the preparation and delivery of action plans covering data, training and intersectionality.

- Report on EDI training in the architecture sector.

- Outputs related to the Commission for Diversity in the Public Realm are being scoped.

2.3.5. Commissioning quality

Proposed activities:

- The GGbD team will establish a new A+U Framework to take the place of the existing Architecture Design and Urbanism Panel 2 (ADUP 2) multidisciplinary supplier framework, which expires in 2021. This will provide a comprehensive Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU)-compliant design framework for use by the GLA Group and other public sector commissioning authorities for architectural, placemaking and urban planning services. Objectives for the panel include supporting design quality, providing skills for recovery and providing a representative panel.

- A programme of webinars will be delivered for enterprises with underrepresented ownership in the built environment sector, to support applications to the A+U Framework, managed through the Responsible Procurement team’s contract with supplier ‘Newable’. Eligible practices that attended the A+U Framework engagement events are referred by GLA officers.

- There will be ongoing governance of the Design Quality Management Protocols being piloted by six GLA Group teams, including support to Housing and Land in launching their Design Management Plan templates and guidance, and roll out of process notes and guidance to support commissioning excellence. Identified topics include architect retention (prepared by LLDC), post-occupancy surveys (prepared by LLDC), design review protocol (prepared by TfL Property) and setting up community review (prepared by OPDC).

Expected outputs and outcomes:

- A+U Framework established.

- Five process notes – sector facing guidance to support quality commissioning.

2.3.6. Championing Good Growth

Proposed activities:

- There will be ongoing utilisation of MDA and Advocate Organisations’ platforms for reach into the sector, helping to test GGbD priorities and positioning and secure buy-in to the programmes’ objectives and activities.

Expected outputs:

- ‘Recovery by Design’ event with the Mayor and MDAs at the London School of Economics – reflecting on the programme since it was established and asserting a future focus on recovery.

- Induction material and event for the new cohort of MDAs, setting priorities and terms of engagement.

- Review and reshape of the GGbD section of london.gov.uk, recognising that GGbD material provides an important reference for the sector and should be accessible.

- Ongoing annual NLA Mayor’s Prize, recognising a project that exemplifies a GGbD priority.

Mayor’s Design Advocates

2.4. To support the proposed pillar-based activities set out above, a new cohort of Mayor’s Design Advocates will be competitively procured. The current cohort of MDAs’ appointments are coterminous with the Mayoral term, with a grace period until September 2021. MDAs will be appointed through a competitive and open process through the TfL eTendering system, ‘ProContract’.

2.5. The top priorities for the new cohort will be:

- to have the right skills and experience to support recovery priorities; and

- to have a panel representative of London’s make-up, working with the Responsible Procurement team to inform the process.

2.6. Prospective MDAs will be invited to provide a short, written application setting out their proposals for how MDAs can support recovery and indicating their top three specialisms. GLA Group teams will be engaged in the process and will provide support through:

- informing the skills requirements set out in the ITT;

- sharing ideas of networks or individuals that the MDA opportunity can be shared with; and

- being part of the selection process.

2.7. Current MDAs are paid a fixed daily rate of £400 per day. It is proposed that this is increased to £500 per day for the new cohort, in line with comparable expert panels. This still reflects good value for money and is factored into budget allocations.

2.8. Analysis of use of the current cohort of MDAs indicates that there is continuing demand for design review skills, and a growing requirement for sustainable design skills and heritage and conservation skills.

Good Growth by Design programme governance

2.9. The programme will be overseen by the following governance structure:

- Good Growth by Design Steering Group, comprising of Executive Directors and Assistant Directors of relevant GLA Group teams, overseeing progress, shaping direction and providing a forum for linkages with other GLA initiatives.

- Design Co-ordination Group, an officer group to share and inform on progress and relevant complimentary work strands across the GLA Group.

- MDA Sounding Boards – project specific Sounding Boards comprising of MDAs and where necessary other external experts, grouped around programme priorities.

2.10. Regular reporting on progress will be provided to Deputy Mayors, Mayoral Advisors and Executive Directors.

3.1. Under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010, the GLA is subject to a public-sector equality duty (“the Duty”) and must have ‘due regard’ to the need to (i) eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment and victimisation; (ii) advance equality of opportunity between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not; and (iii) foster good relations between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not. Protected characteristics under section 149 of the Equality Act are age, disability, gender re-assignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, and marriage or civil partnership status.

3.2. Throughout the process relating to the approvals sought in this paper, due regard has been had to the legislation outlined above. Through the preparation of the programme and all research and communication strands, the GLA will require partners to evaluate the potential impacts regarding protected characteristic groups. Any project must minimise disadvantages to all protected characteristic groups within society.

3.3. The GGbD programme has been progressive in highlighting Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in the built environment. A fundamental objective of the programme is addressing the role of design in forming a more inclusive city, both through the built environment itself and the make-up of the designers, planners and decision makers who are active in city-making. The GGbD Supporting Diversity Handbook is an important tool for supporting equality, diversity and inclusion in the sector, addressing barriers to inclusion at each step of a built environment professional’s career course. The programme convenes six built environment professional bodies to review and foreground EDI plans across the sector. The A+U Framework panel is using pioneering procurement routes and prioritising collaboration to support the growth of practices with under-represented leadership, as well as embedding EDI and social value criteria in all call-off contracts.

3.4. Efforts will be made to reflect London's diversity via MDA appointments. Our ambition for the panel to be reflective on London’s diverse make-up will be stated in the Invitation to Tender, and the opportunity will be advertised and circulated through groups and organisations that represent all sections of the community, particularly, those underrepresented in the sector, in terms of age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, faith or disability.

4.1. Risk register:

4.2. The programme supports key Mayoral policies including:

• Recovery: GGbD programme informs and provides support to the recovery effort and the recovery missions through programme engagement and expertise provided by MDAs.

• Good Growth: Having developed a suite of guidance and piloted best practice innovations in the first Mayoral term, the next term will provide the opportunity to focus on implementation and on operationalising the principles.

• Green New Deal: the programme addresses how a well-designed built environment can play a role in supporting access to nature and open space, which contributes to addressing social/racial injustices and public health problems). It also provides guidance on the role of sustainable design in responding to the climate emergency.

• Supporting Business, Jobs and Growth: the programme addresses the role of the built environment in supporting economic resilience including safeguarding space in the city for industry and business, addressing the future of the Central Activities Zone, understanding how work has changed and how workspace design can respond and championing the design and built environment sector, showcasing London on an international stage.

• A New Deal for Young People: the programme addresses how we can engage more young people in processes of city making, how our public realm can make a more child-friendly city and how social infrastructure can be prioritised to support social integration and provide support services.

4.3. There are no conflicts of interest to note for any of the officers involved in the drafting or clearance of this decision form.

5.1. Approval is sought for the revenue expenditure of up to £168,000 on the Good Growth by Design programme. This will be allocated as £56,000 per annum over the financial years 2021-22, 2022-23 and 2023-24 (subject to the Authority’s budget setting process) and contained in the Good Growth by Design revenue budget held in the Regeneration unit. An additional £44,000 of funding has been made available for the 2021-22 Good Growth by Design programme as agreed in DD2514.

5.2. This decision also seeks the delegation of authority to the Executive Director of Good Growth to allocate the related expenditure to the priorities captured in the six programme pillars as outlined in section 1. The recruitment of a new cohort of Mayor’s Design Advocates is expected to go through an open and competitive procurement process using TfL’s e-tendering system. Payment of expenditure will be made in arrears upon evidence of milestones completed.

6.1. The foregoing sections of this report indicate that:

6.1.1. the decisions requested of the Mayor concern the exercise of the GLA’s general powers, falling within the GLA’s statutory powers to do such things considered to further or which are facilitative of, conducive or incidental to the promotion of economic development and wealth creation, social development or the promotion of the improvement of the environment in Greater London; and

6.1.2. in formulating the proposals in respect of which a decision is sought officers have complied with the GLA’s related statutory duties to:

a) pay due regard to the principle that there should be equality of opportunity for all people;

b) consider how the proposals will promote the improvement of health of persons, health inequalities between persons and to contribute towards the achievement of sustainable development in the United Kingdom; and

c) consult with appropriate bodies.



6.2. In taking the decisions requested, the Mayor must have due regard to the Public Sector Equality Duty; namely the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct prohibited by the Equality Act 2010, and to advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic (race, disability, sex, age, sexual orientation, religion or belief, pregnancy and maternity and gender reassignment) and persons who do not share it (section 149 of the Equality Act 2010). To this end, the Mayor should have particular regard to section 3 of this report.

6.3. Should the Mayor be minded to make the decisions sought officers must ensure that the services required are procured by TfL procurement in accordance with the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code and appropriate contracts are entered into and executed by the GLA and counterparties before commencement of the same.

7.1. The programme is supported by a programme team which compromises of a full-time programme manager, a full-time project officer and a part-time programme director. The project officer is on a fixed term contract which will end in May 2022.

7.2. Project timescales: