Building Strong Communities

Fundamental is that people feel safe, secure and healthy

People will then communicate and identify others in communities of similar place, interest and association which will then evolve into taking part in their communities before ultimately one hopes, contributing to their communities.

The leadership offered by public institutions is also key. Not everyones view is valid, sometimes views are inappropriate or wrong and we need our institutions to call these out.

Without proper funding for local authorities from central government, they cannot respond to local needs as well as they would wish. There is increasing risk of return to the 19th century dependence on charity. The call for personal responsibilty as a solution is pretty close to victim blaming.

I think a strong community starts by creating equal opportunities across the borough. It saddens me that the more affluent areas are focused on more and its upkeep is more apparent here, with more local activities centred here. It seems odd to feel that the areas with less need of attention gets more of it, when really it should be the more deprived areas that should be helped. They seemed forgotten instead. How can we have a more integrated community across different towns in one borough when opportunities are somewhat limited to the more glorified towns of the borough?

I'd love to get to know the people on my street more, but the narrow pavements and noisy, fast-moving motor traffic on our street makes it hard and uninviting to stop and chat. I've noticed that in streets within Low Traffic Neighbourhoods, you often see people hanging around and chatting - with children playing on the streets too. I feel that LTNs would be a great benefit towards increasing a sense of community in most areas and would make people feel more proud of their street.

I think there are small pockets of society that have strong sense of community. Things like schools, religious locations and community centres add to this.
For me, I’ve found it hard to find like minded people in my neighbourhood. In my flats there is a clear sense of common understanding of what is acceptable but I wouldn’t go round and hang out with any of them! But I would say hello if we passed one another.
Community gardens would help! Especially for someone like me who doesn’t have one! :-)

A positive attitude and willingness to participate are prerequisites for positive action and improvement. Pre-pandemic, working hours spent away from home were deracinating people from the communities in which they lived. Perhaps, now that more people have spent more time in their home-area, they will want to join local groups to achieve improvements close to home. Collaboration and a willingness to participate and share with neighbours can do wonders for improving a sense of community and the valuing of a neighbourhood. From Ruth in SE25.

Regeneration has destroyed the strong community that existed, dispersing neighbours to the four winds

Encouraging every person to learn English and IT. I see lot my relatives struggling with spoken English and using modern technology and it should not be like this day and age. In all our community centres we must have classes for teaching English and IT properly.
For young generation we must bring back the home economic subject in schools where they will learn about cooking and other basic stuff that our children are lucking now. They are eating to much processed and fast food which will make them ill in the future. There will be more cost to treat them. We need to act fast to avoid future health chaos.