There is a vital role that enterprise can play in helping to renew our poorest and most marginal communities. It helps to create jobs and stimulate activity in communities where crime and unemployment are high. It helps meet the basic needs of local people, by providing vital services like shops. This report has been prepared in response to the Social Exclusion Unit's publication, Bringing Britain Together. It sets out an ambitious agenda for change - one that requires the participation and partnership of many different players.
Government has a key role, in providing high quality leadership and acting as a catalyst of change.
This needs to be recognised at each of its different levels - national, regional and local. Voluntary organisations have a vital part to play, by helping to shape the debate, and acting as links with communities themselves. But in the end nothing will work without the active engagement of communities themselves - and this report recognises that. The proposals call for a new period of innovation and experimentation, both in Government policy and in the way that banks, business support agencies and others approach these markets. We will be reflecting closely on the recommendations as we take forward work both on the enterprise front and on neighbourhood renewal.