The client

Department for Communities and Local Government

The challenge

With an investment of around £2bn over ten years through its New Deal for Communities (NDC) programme, the government was keen to track the success of its attempts to tackle multiple areas of deprivation in 39 of the country's poorest neighbourhoods.

What we did

After putting together a winning tender in 2001, Sheffield Hallam's Centre for Regional Economic and Social Research (CRESR) was commissioned by the government's Neighbourhood Renewal Unit to head up a five year evaluation of the impact the programme was having so far.

Interim findings published in 2005 indicated that NDCs had made an impact on various aspects of life in those communities, including greater involvement for black and ethnic minority communities, increased population stability, a reduction in the experience of and fear of crime, evidence of new jobs being created, and residents developing more positive feelings about their local neighbourhoods.

The results

In 2005, CRESR was again commissioned to undertake a second phase of the evaluation which is to culminate in a final report in 2010. This phase of the evaluation is looking at the impacts and outcomes of the programme overall, exploring different approaches and activities undertaken by the 39 NDC partnerships, and supporting local evaluation activities.

Professor Paul Lawless, assistant dean (research and business development) at the University, said, 'No-one has ever had the chance to look at area-based regeneration over such a long period of time before, and the results are sure to inform future decisions about this type of intervention. Whichever government is in power, there will always be a debate about how to effect social and economic change in the areas that need it most, and this study has given us a fascinating insight into this particular approach.'