Why we need community-powered neighbourhood governance — and how local infrastructure can support it to happen  

This blog is part of a series written by organisations championing community power. As new neighbourhood governance arrangements are introduced across England through the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, each blog explores how neighbourhood governance can enable local people to have real influence over their places. The series accompanies A Blueprint for Community-Powered Neighbourhood Governance, written by We’re Right Here, with input from Local Trust, Hope Not Hate, Locality, and Power to Change.

Over many years, decision‑making in England has been pulled upwards and away from communities—towards Whitehall, towards national agencies, and towards systems that often feel distant from the people they exist to serve. While local government plays a vital role, the scale of centralisation means that communities themselves rarely hold meaningful power over the issues that shape their everyday lives, leading to a culture and services that ‘do to’ people, rather than ‘with’ or ‘by’ them. 

Building real community power in neighbourhoods puts residents and local organisations at the heart of decision-making. This helps break cycles of disconnection, respond more effectively to local needs, and build a more inclusive, participatory democracy where people are empowered to create change. 

Community power doesn’t happen by accident — it happens when structures exist to support it. That’s why neighbourhood governance is so important. Local people understand the nuances of their community, the potential it holds and the pressures it faces. When communities lead in shaping local decisions, it creates a more responsive, more trusted, and more resilient system. We’re Right Here’s ‘A Blueprint for Community Powered Neighbourhood Governance’ lays out a compelling framework for neighbourhood-level decision-making that provides communities with both the authority and the backing they need to shape their own futures. 

But for neighbourhood governance to succeed, not just as isolated pockets of good practice, but as a consistent, effective, nationwide approach, it needs something else just as crucial. Community power does not flourish simply because governance structures exist on paper. It flourishes when communities are supported by strong, trusted, well‑connected local VCSE infrastructure. 

The role of local infrastructure organisations 

Local infrastructure organisations — NAVCA members — are the connectors, the convenors, and the champions. They bring together community anchors, voluntary groups and resident-led initiatives. They also support community organisations to build skills and confidence, and ensure neighbourhood voices are heard by local authorities and health systems — especially those that might otherwise be overlooked. 

Community anchors — trusted organisations rooted in place — play a central role too. They are often the heartbeat of local neighbourhoods. But even anchors need support, connection, and partnership to deliver long‑term impact. Local infrastructure bodies provide that support, helping anchors link up with statutory partners and share learning. Examples like Leeds Community Anchor Network show that where local infrastructure and community anchors put communities first and collaborate to make change, then the whole is more than the sum of its parts. 

NAVCA supports We’re Right Here’s proposal for a national Neighbourhoods Commissioner, however local accountability and advocacy is at least equally important. Without strong local infrastructure, neighbourhood governance risks becoming fragmented — lots of promising activity but without the coordination needed to create wider, sustainable impact. Without drivers for consistent cultural and policy change in councils and health systems, effective neighbourhood governance runs the risk of becoming limited to a few ‘beacon’ examples. 

For neighbourhoods to truly influence decision‑making, their collective voice needs honest brokers to amplify it and build strategic impact around common themes. Local infrastructure organisations are uniquely positioned to carry those voices, translating local priorities into strategic language and influencing change at scale. 

The Civil Society Covenant provides a national framework for a renewed and more balanced partnership between the VCSE and government. It sets shared principles for how sectors work together, creating the foundations for more trusted, long-term collaboration. Alongside this, the Community Covenants proposed in We’re Right Here’s blueprint offer a practical framework for enabling neighbourhood-level decision-making in a way that is genuinely shaped by local people.  

Local infrastructure organisations have a long and proven history of negotiating partnership frameworks, such as Compacts and, more recently, Covenants, with local authorities and health systems. Through decades of brokering these agreements, they have helped shape the conditions in which collaboration can thrive. These overarching documents do more than formalise commitments: they set expectations for behaviours, embed shared values, and create the cultural foundations that make genuine neighbourhood governance possible.  

Neighbourhood governance could indeed become the connective tissue for all community power initiatives. However, to bring this vision into reality will require concerted effort, not just at the neighbourhood and national levels, but in driving change in local authorities and health systems. Local infrastructure organisations play a key role as the bridge between communities, the VCSE and statutory partners. By working together, communities, community anchors and local infrastructure can create the enabling environment through which neighbourhood-level community power can take root and thrive. 

Read: A Blueprint for Community-Powered Neighbourhood Governance