The Balancing Act: Setting the scene for regeneration

David Meecham: Welcome to The Balancing Act, a podcast from TLT that's an honest conversation about the challenges and opportunities that come with delivering large-scale regeneration projects. I'm David Meecham, a partner at TLT specialising in real estate with nearly 30 years experience.

This podcast is specifically designed to spark fresh thinking and offer practical insights for public sector leaders, developers, funders and advisors. In this launch episode, we're delighted to be joined by Nicola Mathers, Chief Executive of Future of London, a leading voice in housing planning and regeneration. You will know that Nicola works closely with local authorities, housing providers and developers across London to create better places to live and work. She shares her perspective on the pressures and complexities shaping regeneration today, from financial hurdles to delivery challenges and the need for new ways of working. These themes will set the scene for future episodes, hopefully, bringing in new experts and perspectives to help shape the conversation. So Nicola, welcome to the podcast.

Nicola Mathers: Thank you very much for having me, David. It's a pleasure to be here.

David: Great to have you here. Tell us a little bit about yourself.

Nicola: I have the great privilege of running Future of London. We're a non-profit network supporting those working in housing, planning, regeneration and increasingly inclusive growth across London. And we have a sister organisation in Greater Manchester. We very much come from the public sector, but a lot of our work is about sharing and showcasing collaboration between the public and private sector.

David: Very good. Thank you. And we've obviously collaborated previously. In terms of today's conversation, the intention is to be talking about what we think the public and private sectors need to be balancing on the delivery of regeneration, primarily across London. But the conversation may go broader as the podcast continues. So the purpose of this conversation is to outline the questions that we think it might be interesting to hear some answers to. And we might not have some answers today. Who knows? So we've got a few questions that we thought we would run through. So Nicola, what feels hardest about making progress right now?

Nicola: It's quite a long list, to be honest, David. And I guess first one would be funding and viability. It's really hard to deliver much in London at the moment. We're on track for only delivering 5% of our housing target for this year, 2025. I think the way finance is structured is very rigid. I think there's just a lack of money. I think that there's a lot we can do in terms of, and we'll probably come into that rethinking how we do finance. Temporary accommodation is obviously a huge crisis in London with one child in every classroom being homeless, which is just horrendous. And I think there is a lack of seeing this as an absolute crisis and I don't think it's been tackled as a crisis. think that's something that we really need to rethink how we do that. And there's some great innovation that we might come onto with some of the virus.

David: I think for me, the temporary accommodation crisis is probably the most depressing statistic in all of this, isn't it? Because that really is the sharp end of how housing is not helping families, and as you say, children, to be supported and living in a loving and caring home. So, yeah, very difficult.

Nicola: Yeah, I think that ways of working, think that lot of, know, bit environment events talk about partnership working. It's a big thorn in people's side at the moment and I think that there are definitely opportunities to rethink how we do partnerships. There's a lot of challenge in terms of people are public and private sectors working to different time scales, they've got different restrictions, the governance can be frustrating, the speed at which people work can be different. There's the politics obviously, there's the issue around risk and people fearing that risk is just being offshored rather than genuinely shared. And then of course related to sort of place making is the need for a local authority to be able to deliver social value, but that's a really hard thing to kind of quantify and then measure and articulate.

David: It feels as though partnership, this probably sounds like a bit of a naive comment, but it feels as though partnerships is a word that is now being accepted and positively acknowledged as opposed to being something that public and private sectors should try and adopt. It feels as though there is a real bit of weight behind the use of partnerships and an acceptance that both parties need to come to the table and recognise and acknowledge their differences as well as trying to align their overall objectives. And I think we've lost that over the last decade or maybe two. So it feels like we're potentially seeing a bit of progress, possibly.

Nicola: I definitely think so. I think people are understanding that with the now unwavering uncertainty, things aren't going to go back to how they used to be. It's going to be uncertainty. There's going to be increasing complexity with the politics alone. So I think people are thinking, right, okay, so we do need to do things differently. I don't think our sector is terribly good at thinking about doing things differently and innovation. I think it takes a sense of bravery and I think that's what we need a bit more of. But we're seeing lots of ambition from local authorities to be better clients and be more commercial because they're having to and developers really trying to develop as wanting to understand what it's like the other side of the table. So I think there's something about people's needing and, but there is definitely an appetite for seeing the bigger picture and how we can deliver returns on investment and great place making at the same time.

David: Yeah. I've definitely latched onto your two words, innovate, innovative rather than innovation, innovative and bravery. think the brave point is really, is a really good one and obviously it goes in tandem with both authorities and private sector side being innovative in their approach to the delivery of partnerships. think what I worry about sometimes is it may end up becoming more of a talking shop than necessarily actually being delivered but you know let's go into it positively and let's hope that actually this does turn into something. So we're talking about what feels hardest and we've obviously touched on three points. Any others that spring to mind Nicola?

Nicola: I think related to those two or three points is the can you have it all question. Can you deliver great quality design in a development that is also climate resilience, that is also supporting health and wellbeing, that also supports the local economy. It is also providing affordable homes and it's all viable. And I think there's something about, and that's one thing that Future of London is going to be working on next year, is can you have it all? And there are some people that absolutely you should not, there's nothing to negotiate, you have to deliver that versus the, we've got an affordable housing crisis. We absolutely just need to get homes delivered. What's negotiable? And I don't think there's an agreement on what is negotiable. What can drop/doesn't drop what's absolutely redlined. And I think that honest conversation, I think is something that we need to be having. And it's difficult, isn't it? Because developers don't want to come across as being people that are just obsessed about returns, because many of the good developers are absolutely passionate about delivering great communities. But then there's the reality of we've got to get stuff delivered that 5 % 6 % target is not acceptable or a global city.

David: Yeah, I mean, it is to be difficult, isn't it? And it is difficult. That's why we're in this pickle at the moment. It is difficult to be balancing those two sides of the table. I think one of my aspirations is probably the best way to put it is that the private sector takes a view on their long-term investment and their return, which is all very easy for me to say but not necessarily desperately easy for the private sector to acknowledge, which do accept. But it would be great to think about these things as being social enterprise, wouldn't it? Because you were talking about what elements are on the table and need to be negotiated, what needs to be dropped and what doesn't need to be dropped. In my very simple mind, it would be great to think that nothing was dropped. Because wouldn't it be great to be delivering great design, great communities, great neighbourhoods, really promoting place making at the same time as being able to deliver new housing for everybody. And I'm using that phrase rather than saying market for sale, market for rent, affordable, social. But as I say, that's an aspiration. And I think a big one. Maybe not achievable.

Nicola: And then we've also got to think about legacy, haven't we? Because if we, you know, I remember like I used to work for commission for architecture, but one we used to do housing audits, you know, and you'd be looking at housing developments that are having, because they were built so badly being rebuilt in 20, 30 years time. I met, you know, we see the condition of some other housing stock now is making people ill. We don't want to look back and think, that’s what we did. We built some homes, built some numbers, but actually the homes that we built were awful, or had to be pulled down, or just aren't good enough. And I think particularly with climate resilience is a really difficult one because our cities are going to become unbearable in many places to live. And it's the most vulnerable communities that are going to be hit the worst. So therefore, the affordable homes that we're building need to be comfortable for people. And there's that question, isn't it? Does good design cost more

David: The question that pops into my mind having heard you say that is what role, and I'm going off topic, what role does MMC have in all of this?

Nicola: Really interesting. We've done quite a lot of work with borough housing development teams, those borough teams that delivering council homes and everyone comes back to MMC has got to be part of the solution but many have had their fingers burned in trying to deliver MMC and supply chain failure or the sites that they've got just being too complex for MMC to be able to go ahead. But no matter all of that sort of challenge, it still comes back to this might be the answer. think it's tough.

David: And do we have the technical knowledge now to know that the current use of MMC is not going to fail us in 30 years time do you think?

Nicola: I think that's a great question. I'm a fan because I see that the way MMC is built in a factory, therefore the quality standards, it's a manufacturing process, so therefore the quality can be assured. So in theory, the answer is yes. I think it's more about, is it more about how it gets built on site and do we have the skills and trades? I might be completely wrong to, it comes out of the factory and it's great. But what about actually putting it on site and then the management and maintenance and that sort of handover. Do we know how to look after this stock because it's different. And it's the same, it, sort of, know, green technology and homes. If people don't understand how to use it or maintenance teams don't understand how to look after it, they get switched off or taken out.

David: Yeah. Yeah. I'm just thinking in the context of, the terrible disaster of Grenfell and also the passing of AWAB's law relatively recently. It does make one think, will MMC be the right answer? Because no one would have necessarily known at the time that the cladding was used on Grenfell that that was necessarily not a good thing to be doing or that the design of the building wasn't appropriate in that circumstance because you're trying to future-proof something where you don't necessarily know what you're trying to future-proof against. But I realise that we've slightly gone off topic, Nicola. So thank you for that deviation and diversion down that boulevard. So obviously Nicola, we've just been talking about what feels hardest at the moment and we've run through three topics, funding and viability, temporary accommodation and ways of working and then I took us off on a bit of a frolic down the MMC road.

The other two topics that I'd like to talk about, is procurement, which anyone who knows me will know is a topic that is a very favourite one of mine for some bizarre reason, and also resource shortages, because that's one of the things that always gets talked about at the moment. any thoughts about procurement and the way in which it's been reformed and what that might look like and how things might be improved?

Nicola: So it's interesting, isn't it? You say procurement, a lot of people will roll their eyes because it's a hugely frustrating process both sides of the table, I think. And it's something that we're going to be looking at next year. And we've been doing some research into what people find so frustrating. And it's about rigidity. It's about processes being really opaque, lack of transparency, drawn out, not fit for purpose if it's just a really small or medium-sized project. It's expensive, it's been described by our private sector partners as a beauty parade and they really feel like it shouldn't be about the private sector and the suppliers parading. It's a two-way thing because you're also buying into a relationship and how do we bring that conversation and that acknowledgement in. I think it's interesting, you probably have a view on this standardisation, people feel like a lot of local authority time is being spent on the process and actually is standardisation appropriate? I don't know, because every relationship, every partnership, every place is different. And then the issue we talked about for social value, know, social value, it's really important, but it's really hard to define, it's hard to measure and it's all a bit sort of tricky.

David: Yeah, it's a bit intangible, isn't it? Although there is a model that tries to make it a tangible thing.

Nicola: So I think there's definitely, it's the same with partnerships, there's definitely an appetite for maybe not rethinking procurement, but where are the opportunities? There is already flexibility in the system that people think isn't necessarily being maximised. I think there is where the point was, I think there's opportunity to showcase how people have done procurement differently. There isn't much learning, I think, between people are going down certain routes, this didn't work, this worked, this has worked really well for us. Obviously, massive frustration from developers where every single borough has a different process. Back to my standardisation point, but I think it frustrates everyone, so surely there are ways and I think, yeah, some of our partners are starting to see innovation coming out of the new regulations but I think it's a matter of you know really showcasing that and sharing that across London or other cities to say this is what this is what's being done this is what innovation looks like so that other people can share from that.

David: Yeah I mean there are so many points in that to follow on I mean your point about standardisation and the approach particularly if we're talking about London, which obviously we are talking about Greater London and all the various London boroughs, you've certainly heard me talk about my frustrations at there being a lack of standard approach across London boroughs so that you can sometimes on my side of the table find that you're having the same conversation with a number of different London boroughs without necessarily a knowledge of what's going across more broadly or the sort of best practice in terms of how to run a procurement process. And if I'm honest, also a bit of an unwillingness to necessarily hear it because everybody wants to be innovative, going back to that word that we were talking about earlier on. And that's the challenge. You want to be innovative, but also at the same time, you don't want to be innovative at the cost of running a process that is A, attractive, B, quick and C gives you the result or rather well gives anybody the result public and private sector the result that they want.

Nicola: Given this is one of your favourite topics can I ask is there something about communication between those working in development in a borough and their procurement teams and maybe their legal teams? Definitely. Do you think that they are completely on the same page?

David: There is definitely a need for communication and that's one of the things that we like to do here in the day job is to be ensuring that we are communicating as clearly and transparently to, as you say, development teams, procurement teams and legal teams so that everybody is brought on the journey. That is difficult because some boroughs have a very different approach to where the procurement team sits, where the legal team sits, how large that legal team may be, and whether the routes that the development team wants to use is actually going to be a route that is both procurement and procurement compliant essentially, bit of a gear change but the second topic that I said that I wanted us to touch on was the resource shortage. I'm moving away from my favourite topic of procurement.

So resource shortage, what's your view on that Nicola?

Nicola: It's just so tough for our local authorities at the moment and the constant restructure, like every three years I feel like teams are being restructured, resources are being, you know, teams are being cut, resources being cut. But, you know, part of Future of London's remit is leadership training and it's building the capacity of teams. And I think that's critical. And then it saddens me when you see one of the first things that gets cut is a training budget. And you're like, you've got less people, you need them to be, you need their capability built, you need to retain those staff, you need to invest in them. And that's an easy thing. And it's, I find that is really challenging. That said, you've got amazing people working in London boroughs, like so smart, so committed to delivering for communities, clever about the way that they go about the politics and the delivery. And so it kind of, gives you hope. But I think that the diversity of thought I think is really important as well. And maybe we'll come onto that, but, bringing people in, think local authorities are now consciously supporting their teams to be more commercial and to be better development partners. And I think that is a real shift for boroughs. In the leading boroughs, which I shall not name, maybe I should, we really feel a sense of that.

David: Yeah, I mean, would definitely wholeheartedly agree with you. I am actually going to name and shame because the one person that I look at and think about what an amazing legacy she created is Alice Lester at London Borough of So just thinking about what you've just said, she has done nothing other than try to deliver neighbourhoods and new communities and achieve the best for her borough. And, you know, obviously she's now retired, but that's somebody who immediately springs to mind for me. In terms of the resource shortage as we see it, I think we probably see it as a more frustrate--well probably the same as you in terms of it being frustrating. We see the frustration from the private sector saying to us, well, the public sector never have enough people. It's a revolving door. They never have the same team members. They don't have enough people in planning the age old topics. And it is a really difficult one, I think to fix without some market shift in funding. But your point around the resource that is being there, being trained effectively on how to lead and how to be a commercial development partner to pick up on your point is absolutely key, isn't it? To the future of partnership working, reform on procurement and speedier processes, delivery of TA to a certain extent and also thinking about funding and viability because ultimately the commerciality of the individual will impact their ability to be able to secure funding and make the schemes viable potentially.

So thinking about what we've just been talking about, Nicola, and the sector's biggest challenge, or challenges rather, there's challenges, I wish there was only one challenge, but yeah, there are a ⁓ number of them. That obviously creates opportunities, and opportunities probably on both sides of the table. Are there any particular points that you might think about airing in terms of opportunities for those involved in these types of schemes?

Nicola: Well think one of the big challenges is politics. know, the four year political cycle makes it hard for decision making and long term thinking but what we're seeing is Reform – even in London - bringing political parties together. And here you're meaning reform the political party as opposed to reform of reform as a thing. reform with a capital R, which I think is really interesting. And I think that some of our SME member consultancies are going into councils and trying to capital R Reform-proof development strategies. So I think that is a catalyst for working in a way that we wouldn't probably have seen otherwise. I think that is really interesting. And I think that probably also reinforces the need to bring communities with you. So it doesn't matter, you know, whatever political parties imposed, if the community is for development, for example, wants affordable housing and is supportive of it makes a massive difference of course our industry cannot always be great at communicating the benefits of development to communities and I think that's something we need to do better on.

David: I mean we've all seen examples of where communities have been engaged successfully and examples of where communities have not been engaged successfully and they can become the biggest blocker after all.

Nicola: Absolutely, causing really expensive delays and stress and that can be addressed and we're in fact doing a piece of research at the moment on helping people build a business case for doing community engagement properly.

David: So in terms of another opportunity, Nicola, I suppose, bearing in mind where we put temporary accommodation in the list when we were talking about challenges earlier on, there's clearly an opportunity for innovative housing solutions. And there are organisations out there that I'm sure both you and I have encountered who come up with really innovative solutions on houses that can be delivered or homes that can be delivered within a matter of hours. But actually just coming back to funding Nicola, where do you think the opportunities might lie on funding? Cause that's a difficult one.

Nicola: It's really tough, isn't it? And I think it comes down to rethinking the funding models and making them less rigid and thinking about housing and placemaking in the wider sense. London Council's published a report today and some of their suggestions around that was something they're calling social rent convergence. So adding three pounds a week to social rent to try and equal it up so people are paying the same for the same sorts of properties and that would generate £588 million for local authorities in London over five years. And I think also, I don't know if it's for the same for developers, but definitely for local authorities, really thinking about the potential for estate regeneration. We need warm safe dry homes for people to live in. That's part of it, it's not just about the numbers, it is also about the quality of the homes that people living in. So it's sort of taking that bigger picture. And whether there is appetite from government and the GLA or Homes England for that, I'm not sure.

David: Yeah, I mean, this conversation really does prove that there are so many different things to be considering. Which is why it's so hard. is why it's so hard, absolutely. And why I don't think we necessarily have all of the answers right here, right now, which is part of the rationale for having this conversation and opening up this podcast in the hope that we will in the future be talking to others involved in the sector who will be able to maybe give their thoughts on some of these difficult challenges that we've spoken about and talk through some of the opportunities as well.

So Nicola, thinking about resource shortages and some of the frustrations that may be aired about there being a lack of capacity within public sector, we have to talk about AI and the potential for a role of AI and generative AI. Do you think that that would work for the purposes of trying to plug some of that resource shortage?

Nicola: Potentially. I think without doubt AI is going to change, transform the way we plan, design, deliver, look after our built environment without a doubt. I just think it's very unknown at the moment. And I think the issue with AI is that people jump into that technology is the solution without really understanding what is the question, what is the thing that I'm trying to solve? And then is it technology, AI, data digital, the answer? But I think with, I feel like there is great potential, even for us within our team at Future of London using it to work more efficiently and to do a lot of the legwork and that's, you know, we check everything. I think there is a lot of skepticism with AI and people having their, you know, fingers burnt with IT systems that haven't worked, they're kind of overwhelmed by choice, the worry about kind of getting locked into something that then doesn't evolve with need over time. For the public sector, at least the ethics and the security is a massive issue. And there's some sort of mismatch between, you know, people that work in the built environment and really understand the built environment and then technology and how do you get the two together. So I think there's definitely potential. I think it's working out how do you make AI work for this problem.

David: That's a really good point because I think when we talk about AI in this context, or indeed probably in any context, what we don't remember is the fact that we are now using AI tools like Copilot. We've got Legora, which is a legal generative AI tool, not that we yet use it, although we are looking at trying to use it. So, of course, there are things that can be used in the wider process of delivery of these schemes. people might think AI is something bigger than it actually is. Something that is, a tangible product, a tangible person. We're forgetting that AI is in everyday use and actually that is something that is really helpful in helping to deliver these schemes in small ways.

Nicola: It's baby steps, isn't it? It is baby steps. And I also think because we're talking about where there are opportunities and challenges is if you've got teams of young people, young people are like, I am... Very young. Midlife. I'm not tech savvy, young people in my team or in any team, they'll have grasped, they'll be using it as part of the way they live their lives. And how are we capitalising on that knowledge from younger peers within our teams?

David: Very good point and in fact we were at a round table last week where someone, one of the contributors around the table was saying exactly that. It's not just about AI, it's about getting the young people involved and hearing their voice and hearing their knowledge because they are the ones who are going to be able to use AI in the future, not us. I mean I'm an absolute dinosaur when it comes to technology. But I think probably we probably need to think about wrapping up this conversation Nicola, in terms of what do we think out of everything that we've spoken about are the key bits where we probably don't necessarily have an answer and they are the really difficult hard challenges where we want to hear from other voices. I think in my mind, there are a number of areas and see whether you agree. think MMC and technical knowledge of MMC and whether or not that is going to be fit for the future is an interesting area and I'm not just saying that because I happen to mention it. Is it going to solve the problems? Is it going to solve the problems? Is it a better solution than other things? Don't know. TBD.

Community engagement actually is one that I feel is an important one. Funding models and maybe alternative delivery models. The age-old question of to procure or not to procure. That's one of the things that I banged on about for a very long period of time, which neatly rolls into procurement, neatly rolls into partnerships. And then there's also the point about good design, which links in with community engagement and place making. Now, of course, Future of London next year have got some initiatives which they're going to be starting off around partnerships, procurement and place making. All about the p’s. All about the Three p’s. Any others that spring to mind that you think might be worthy of more detailed dive conversations?

Nicola: So I would say something, not a detailed, I think those for me and our network are domain issues that I think that we don't know the answer to. So to dig into those, to find people that can come and talk about solutions and be that optimist. And I think finding solutions out of London, even out of sector, I think would be really interesting. It doesn't have to be the environment in London. But overall for me, I think that goes across all these themes is that how do we create a culture and a mindset for innovation and change? How do we get people, because it's fundamental to what we're trying to do as an organization as well, how do you get people to take a systems thinking approach? All of these things are really complicated. It's a combination and the solution will come from the public, private and the community sectors. So how do we elevate ourselves above a challenge and think bigger picture and trying to unpick that complexity. And is that bravery of doing things differently? And I don't think as an industry, we're, we're as terribly good at that. And then finally, like, which I guess would be my challenge to you, like find the champions for that. Who is championing this? Who is championing? I can see champions within individual organisations, but as a sector, like who's pushing this forward?

David: Yeah, I agree. I agree with you. I mean, there are definitely some people on in my list in my mind as to who we should be talking to, to try and take this conversation further. But I agree with you. Who are the champions in the sector? And I don't know the answer to that right here, right now. It sounds to me there's quite a challenge, isn't there? For me, actually, in terms of trying to make sure that we get the right people on the podcast, but also making sure that public sector leaders are actually navigating regen challenges. And I think one of my key takeaways from what we've been saying today is mindset matters. And that certainly came out from the round table that we were at last week or the week before. Be brave to pick up on your point. Be first, innovative. Be open. So whether it's trialling new procurement models, embracing digital delivery or using AI in these schemes, or asking the unusual, the unlikely, the different contributors might be something for us to be thinking about.

And so I think probably Nicola, that wraps it up for the purposes of our conversation today. Thank you very much for your time and for joining us.

Nicola: Thank you very much for having me. It's been good. I'm looking forward to in a year's time us knowing all the answers to these questions.

David: Exactly. Well, we will be wrapping this back up with a conclusion session in a year's time. That's very good challenge. So thanks for listening to The Balancing Act. If you've enjoyed this episode, please subscribe on your usual podcast platform. To hear more conversations about shaping next-gen cities, visit tlt.com or follow us on LinkedIn.