Advocating for change

Plunkett UK works in rural areas that are often overlooked and in decline.

Community-owned businesses safeguard vital services, create employment and volunteering opportunities, boost the local economy, and address a wide range of social and inclusion issues.

We work with a wide range of partners and engage with all political parties across the UK to champion the needs of our membership and promote the transformative impact that community ownership can bring to local areas across the country.

Your donation will help us to complete research which evidences the impact of the growing community ownership movement.

Our call to Government

We engage with government on behalf of our rural community business members, urging it to deliver on its promise of inclusive economic growth and ensure that no community is left behind.

We urge policy makers to acknowledge that rural disadvantage – poverty, employment or access to services – is often dispersed and hidden within national statistics. A place-based approach to growth must uncover and address these inequalities.

With the right support and investment, Plunkett believes that together we could grow the opening rate of rural community businesses from 30 to 60 a year over a period of 10 years.

“For too long, governments have overlooked the vital role of rural community businesses in tackling isolation, maintaining local services and creating economic resilience. We urge ministers to recognise and back this proven model, and to work with Plunkett to ensure their initiatives are reaching rural areas, where there is a track record for long-term sustainability.”

James Alcock, Chief Executive, Plunkett UK

Plunkett has five priorities for government intervention to ensure a growing and thriving community business sector:

Community businesses deliver significant social, economic and environmental value alongside commercial activity. Government should create a fiscal framework that recognises this contribution and rewards purpose-led business models.

This could include targeted reliefs, exemptions or incentives across business rates, National Insurance, VAT and other taxation measures. At a minimum, community-owned businesses should benefit from enhanced and permanent business rates relief that reflects the wider value they create for local communities.

Community ownership remains one of the most effective tools available to communities seeking to save essential local assets and services. However, funding programmes often overlook rural communities, where deprivation can be less visible but where service loss can have profound consequences.

The recently -announced £61 million Community Right to Buy Fund presents an important opportunity. Plunkett believes a population-proportionate allocation of 17% should be ringfenced for rural communities, reflecting the fact that approximately 17% of the population lives in rural areas.

New housing developments should create thriving places, not simply deliver housing numbers. Community-owned businesses can play a vital role in creating social infrastructure and building public support for development.

Government should utilise ongoing planning reform to:

  • Require meaningful community engagement at the earliest stages of development
  • Embed community ownership opportunities within major developments; by embedding opportunities to create or fund community businesses within Section 106 agreements
  • Increase transparency and local accountability over how community infrastructure funding is spent.

These reforms would help ensure that development is undertaken with communities rather than simply for them, creating stronger, healthier, more resilient places in rural suburban and urban areas alike.

Community-owned businesses can play a vital role in supporting public services within their communities, but tight financial margins mean that the cost can be prohibitive.

Plunkett advocates for services such as the Post Office to form flexible agreements with community-owned businesses, allowing them to sustain public services that are needed in local communities without bearing unsustainable additional cost.

Every rural community is different, and while national policy can play a key role in facilitating growth, devolved and local approaches are also important to ensure community business can thrive.

For Plunkett this involves:

  • Supporting Welsh partners to shape the delivery of the Welsh Government’s Community Right to Buy Scheme
  • Contributing to Scottish Government initiatives to support last provider businesses and ensuring that previously innovative Scottish Community Right to Buy legislation is adapted to meet modern economic and social challenges
  • Meeting regularly with civil servants and MPs across UK Government departments, including the Business and Trade, DEFRA and MHCLG, to ensure that members’ needs are represented and heard across government

Read our latest research report

If you are a member and would like to raise an issue, or discuss our policy and advocacy work, please email Ian Young, our Policy Manager.

Email us

We collaborate with the following partners

Power to Change

Community Shares Booster Fund and Coops UK

Esmee Fairbairn

Rural Services Network

Association of Convenience Stores

Rural Coalition

We’re Right Here

Access – the Foundation for Social Investment

Better Society Capital

Thakeham

Barratt Redrow

Join the movement: Become a member today

As our membership grows, so does the profile of our movement. If you are not already a Plunkett member, please sign up today. You can become an individual supporter for just £22.50 a year and show your support for this growing sector.

If you are interested in learning more about our research and policy work, please do get in touch with us at policy@plunkett.co.uk or make a donation to support our research activity.

Share This Story, Choose Your Platform!