The new champions of sustainable community participation?

The publication by the Government towards the end of 1995 and early 1996 of a series of White Papers on rural areas in England, Scotland and Wales marked a potentially important milestone for rural planning throughout the United Kingdom. In particular, the Scottish Rural White ' Paper, Rural Scotland: People, Prosperity and Partnership, with its emphasis on partnership working, reasserted some traditional conservative values with a strong emphasis on the role of the voluntary sector. For the Scottish Office, the proposed Local Rural Partnerships are seen as the principal vehicle for implementing and integrating community-based initiatives. For the Scottish Office, central to the bottom-up and integrated approach -almost a necessity in their implementation - is the partnership principle (outlined in schematic form on the facing page). The White Paper advocates a process which includes the establishment of the National Rural Partnership to advise and support the development of a number of Local Rural Partnerships. The National Rural Partnership fulfils this role principally through the production and dissemination of guidance and the administration of the Rural Partnership and Rural Challenge Grant Schemes. Local Rural Partnerships may be formed as 'strategic', 'area based' or 'thematic' partnerships, and operate to fulfil locally identified priorities as well as to inform the National Rural Partnership's role as advisor to the Government. The support for the development of a more community-based approach in rural planning and development is also beginning to find clear expression in European Union rural policies.