Emma Vandore reports on the TCPA’s Annual Conference ‘Re-building Britain – Shaping Our Future

This article was published in the January edition of the TCPA journal.

Britain‘s housing crisis – and particularly how reforms to the planning system will address the chronic shortfall – dominated debate at the TCPA’s Annual Conference, held at the beginning of December. In an era of spending cuts, debate at One Whitehall Place centred on concerns over affordable and social housing and the lack of strategic spatial guidance on how many homes are needed and where.

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Know Place on Tech City

What began as a spontaneous clustering of start-ups in London’s East End is turning into a global hub of the digital industry – as the government is branding Tech City. It seems to be working. Entrepreneurs I’ve been interviewing for a series of research projects report that government attention is bringing useful visibility and prestige.

The Shoreditch entrepreneurs affect a low-key, British approach, referring to the area as Silicon Roundabout – a reference to the ugly Old Street traffic circle at the heart of the area – but the multimillion pound success of companies such as Last.fm and Tweetdeck belies their modesty. Music website Last.fm was sold to CBS for £140m, and Tweedeck, an application developed to help users manage their Twitter feeds, was bought by Twitter for £25m earlier this year. The hope of the British government, like administrations the world over, is to create an environment that nurtures a home-grown Google or Facebook.

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