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Over the last decade, Greater Manchester's city-regional centre has become an important site for build to rent (BTR) housing development in the UK. The growth of this new tenure raises important empirical and conceptual questions about how far and through what means BTR has extended in post-industrial cities like Manchester, as well as how to theorise the global–local relations involved in BTR development. Drawing on a self-built database of 155 development projects incorporating 45,069 new housing units, we show that new-build BTR units have outpaced 'build to sell' (BTS) units almost two to one in Manchester's city-regional centre since 2012. We also found stronger international investment in BTR relative to BTS, illustrating BTR's more globalised and financialised form. Our paper understands BTR growth in Manchester as the outcome of a transcalar territorial network – an assemblage of national policy objectives, local state actors' urban regeneration activity and heterogenous global investor groups with different priorities all seeking a return. We highlight the important role of national and local state subsidies and local authority joint ventures in constructing a territory conducive for BTR investment in Manchester. We also show how the fungibility of BTR assets as a 'networked product' widens the investment appeal of the tenure type, broadening and deepening housing financialization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: With increasing numbers of oral cancer diagnoses and guidance recommending that patients approach their doctors or dentists for assessments, when searching for information regarding mouth cancer, patients may first look to their dental practice website. This study aimed to evaluate the variance of patient information provided regarding oral cancer on dental practice websites. Materials and methods: Dental practices within the Manchester area with an active website were included with assessment of whether there was any information provided regarding reducing oral cancer risk factors, signs to look out for and if oral cancer screening was included as part of the general check-up, using a three-point score based on the joint statement from the British and Irish Society for Oral Medicine (BISOM) and Cancer Research UK (CRUK) regarding oral cancer diagnosis and prevention. Results: In total, 66.6% (n=60) of practices provided no accessible information regarding oral cancer screening and prevention on their websites. Only 12.2% (n=11) discussed all three factors of oral screening, symptoms and reducing risk factors. Screening as part of routine examination was most frequently mentioned at 27% (n=24), risk factors were discussed by 23% (n=21) of practices and symptoms to be aware of by 13% (n=12). Discussion: There is a lack of information available to patients on dental practice websites regarding oral cancer. To overcome lack of quality assurance on the internet, dentists can provide factual information via their dental practice websites. This could help with improving patient awareness and therefore aiding in early detection, improving patient outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to understand how the UK government's headline climate change targets are translated into action at the local level in the transport sector drawing on the findings of research in two English regions. In doing so, these headline targets are identified as a symbolic meta-policy that results in little action on the ground and which challenges established conceptions of policy implementation. Both the 'meta' and 'symbolic' aspects of the policy offer part of the explanation for the lack of substantive action on the ground. As a meta-policy, the headline targets across government require the elaboration of other policies at other levels such as targets for government departments and local authorities, but these are largely absent, leaving the meta-policy without teeth. Over time, these headline targets have developed into a symbolic policy, serving political goals but having little practical effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a long lineage in neighbourhood research that has underpinned sustained academic and policy interest in the UK centred on understanding how spatial 'clusters' of neighbourhood-based deprivation might be destabilised. This has seen the privileging of composite indices in the analysis of deprivation, which have been criticised for fostering a common perception that deprived neighbourhoods are homogeneous in terms of their compositions and underlying structures. Such indices have also been criticised for being ineffective at capturing temporal change, providing only static snapshots of deprivation at particular points in time. This paper focuses on patterns of deprived neighbourhood change in the Greater Manchester city-region between 2001 and 2007. It develops a typology of neighbourhood change that is triangulated with three complementary typologies capturing the socioeconomic and demographic compositions of deprived neighbourhoods; the functional roles played by deprived neighbourhoods in redistributing population through migration; and the spatial contexts in which deprived neighbourhoods are located. The analysis reveals that an overreliance on static indices to measure deprivation has long served to conceal complexities in the ways in which deprived neighbourhoods change, owing to their variable structures and contexts. It illustrates the danger that lies in treating all deprived neighbourhoods in the same way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is two-fold. First, to outline some of the reasons for the relative neglect of sociologists to study or give emphasis in their analyses to transport systems and, in particular, to social interaction in the social conduit of the street. The second aim is to present some of the sociological factors relating to the behavior of different types of road users in the Greater Manchester area. The frame of reference adopted from which the data have been primarily assembled has been that of the city's traffic wardens. More specifically, the analysis will polarise around an examination of the territorial-defence theory of aggression, which has been operationalised quite recently, as an explanation for the violent behavior of motorists on the road and the resulting high incidence of fatalities and serious injuries. The tremendous impact the motor car has had on society and everyday life is self-evident. It has produced its own code of law; its own language; it creates ephemeral, new hierarchies of prestige on the road; and, not least, it has its own collective and privatized, symbolic meanings.

The article asks why institutional reforms work in one place and not another and why old ways of doing things can prove so resilient. It argues in favour of a concept of institutional formation, which is different from 'institutional design' as a time-limited event or 'institutional change' as an open-ended historical trajectory. Institutional formation is conceptualised as an animated, nested and embedded process. A multi-level framework is developed that specifies the links between institutional actors, institutional rules and institutional contexts. The model is elaborated with reference to a case study of local government reform in England, specifically the devolution of responsibilities from central government to voluntary collaborations of elected local authorities ('combined authorities'). The model is used to explain variation in the process of institutional formation in two different city-regions, focusing on the role of leaders, legacies and localities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]