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Research has suggested that connexions between humans and the natural world lead to increased well-being and generate pro-environmental attitudes, which in turn benefit nature. This article asks whether users of outdoor public spaces in the UK during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 experienced greater connectedness with nature, consistent with the five “pathways to nature connectedness” identified in previous research. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of 42 individuals on their use of green and public spaces during the UK's lockdown, while a further 29 participants responded to an online survey. While the research revealed the importance of nature connectedness, only three of the five pathways were well-evidenced, and these connexions were frequently mediated by social activities. The article advances the study of nature connectedness by identifying challenges in applying the pathways framework and suggesting areas for further research to understand how the pathways operate in real-world conditions.

The UK government’s new Industrial Strategy could have a significant impact on the country’s regions and localities. However, this has received little attention to date. The analysis presented here examines the existing location of the sectors targeted by the first phase of the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund and the location of the R&D laboratories likely to be first in line for funding. In focusing on an extremely narrow range of sectors, the Fund is likely to have limited impact on the UK’s persistent regional inequalities. The activities eligible for support account for relatively little of manufacturing or the rest of the economy and the basis of this targeting and its potential distributional consequences are spatially blind. As such, it runs the risk of widening regional divides in prosperity.

Key Points\ud \ud - This report challenges the view that the UK economy is operating at or close to full employment. It presents alternative estimates of the level of unemployment, based on a re-working of official statistics, for every local authority district in England, Scotland and Wales.\ud - The report estimates that in 2017 the ‘real level of unemployment’ across Britain as a whole is nearly 2.3 million. This compares with just under 800,000 on the claimant count and 1.5 million on the wider ILO measure of unemployment preferred by the government.\ud - The report estimates that there are some 760,000 ‘hidden unemployed’ on incapacity-related benefits (these days primarily Employment and Support Allowance). These are men and women who might have been expected to be in work in a genuinely fully employed economy. They do not represent fraudulent claims.\ud - The real level of unemployment and the scale of hidden unemployment have both fallen since 2012. However, there remain almost as many unemployed ‘hidden’ on incapacity benefits as ‘visible’ on the unemployment claimant count.\ud - Hidden unemployment is disproportionately concentrated in the weakest local economies, particularly Britain’s older industrial areas and a number of seaside towns. The effect is to mask the true scale of labour market disparities between the best and worst parts of the country.\ud - In a number of local economies, including much of North East England, East Lancashire, Merseyside, the Welsh Valleys and the Birmingham and Glasgow areas, the real level of unemployment remains at or just below 10 per cent of the working age population. Much of southern and eastern England outside London, with real unemployment in the 2-3 per cent range, could however lay claim to operating near full employment.

Key points\ud - The new money that the UK government has allocated to support its industrial strategy is targeted at R&D in an exceptionally narrow range of sectors – healthcare & medicine, robotics & artificial intelligence, batteries, self-driving vehicles, materials for the future and satellites & space technology.\ud - Even on a generous definition of the industries that might benefit from the new Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund, these sectors account for little more than 1 per cent of the whole economy (by employment) and 10 per cent of UK manufacturing.\ud - The jobs in the sectors targeted by the Fund are highly unevenly spread across the country. The pattern is more complex than a simple North-South divide but a number of places in southern England have substantially more jobs in these sectors than industrial cities such as Bradford, Leicester, Manchester, Middlesbrough, Nottingham, Stoke and Swansea.\ud - The distribution across the country of research and development establishments – along with universities and R&D labs in large companies likely to be first in line for the new R&D funding – is particularly skewed in favour of an arc to the immediate north, west and south of London.\ud - Even excluding its famous university, the Cambridge area (population just 285,000) has twice as many jobs in scientific research and development establishments as the whole of the Midlands, more than Scotland and Wales combined, and only 2,000 fewer than the whole of the North of England (population 15.2 million).\ud - The report concludes that the government’s sectoral focus is exceptionally narrow – too narrow alone to provide a base on which to build a revival of British industry.\ud - The report also concludes that the government’s narrow sectoral focus threatens to widen regional divides. It is Cambridge, Oxfordshire, the Thames Valley, Hertfordshire and London itself that may gain most in the first instance.

This evidence review explores the links between poverty and transport to support a wider study into how the transport barriers to work for residents in low income neighbourhoods can be addressed. It argues that transport issues faced by households in poverty are not just a matter of physical infrastructure but are shaped by the nature and location of both housing and employment. For this reason, the review includes discussion of how poverty interacts with these domains in ways that often reinforce transport barriers for low income households. It also considers how these barriers are not just practical or material but also shaped by a range of social, cultural and psychological factors in terms of attachment to place and 'spatial horizons'.

This report demonstrates the opportunities for local partners to do more to ensure that\ud unemployed people benefit from job and training opportunities created by development,\ud setting out a framework for use by local authorities, partner organisations and employers.\ud Development projects create valuable employment and training opportunities, but those\ud opportunities do not automatically help to tackle unemployment and poverty.

Introduction - Richard Crisp and Will Eadson.\ud \ud Crisis? What crisis? Housing policies from the main parties in England, Scotland and Wales for the 2015 general election - Ian Cole.\ud \ud Peering beyond the cliff-edge: what role for the voluntary sector in post-election United Kingdom? - Chris Dayson.\ud \ud Urban planning dilemmas: where next? - Karen Escott.\ud \ud Regional development: a casualty of the general election? - Steve Fothergill.\ud \ud The 2015 general election and the impending crisis in local public services - Tony Gore.\ud \ud Migration policy: stuck in a rut?\ud David Robinson

Policy responses to the problems facing rural areas across Europe have involved the replacement of “ productivist” measures that subsidise agriculture to strategies promoting “ integrated rural development”, emphasising the interconnections between various facets of the rural economy. Thus farm modernisation and product processing and marketing are linked with the promotion of a more diversified economic base centred on tourism and recreation and the maintenance of services for local residents. An essential element of this model is its reliance on collaborative actions involving a range of community or civil society actors. This paper examines the extent to which the operation of community-owned businesses in rural parts of the Yorkshire and Humber region in the UK corresponds to these ideals of integrated rural development. Evidence is presented on their geographical footprint with respect to both direct economic impacts and linkages with social and institutional networks. This allows an assessment to be made of the contribution that such enterprises make to rural economic development as a whole. The conclusion is that they do have the potential to assist integrated rural development, but only as a small part of a much wider series of economic, social and environmental actions., La contribution des coopératives rurales au développement rural intégré : de véritables services d’approvisionnement pour la population locale Les problèmes actuels des espaces ruraux européens impliquent moins des mesures sectorielles agricoles que des stratégies en faveur d’un «développement rural intégré » . Ainsi, la modernisation et la diversification des exploitations agricoles sont-elles souvent liées au développement d’une base économique plus hétérogène, comportant une part importante d’activités destinées à satisfaire les demandes résidentielles et récréatives. Cette stratégie suppose un haut niveau de coordination entre les différents agents économiques et, plus largement, avec tous les acteurs de la société locale. Cet article analyse la contribution des coopératives rurales d’approvisionnement au développement rural. Malgré des effets économiques directs et induits relativement limités, leur impact local est important en raison de l’activation des réseaux sociaux et institutionnels. Elles offrent effectivement des possibilités adaptées au service d’un développement rural intégré. Il ne s’agit cependant que d’un levier parmi une palette beaucoup plus large d’actions économiques, sociales et environnementales., Gore Tony, Wells Peter, Powell Ryan. The contribution of rural community businesses to integrated rural development: « Local services for local people ». In: Cahiers d'Economie et sociologie rurales, N°80, 3e trimestre 2006. pp. 29-52.

The purpose of this report is to assess whether investment in Green Infrastructure increases economic growth, based on the available evidence. We take Green Infrastructure (GI) to mean a planned approach to the delivery of nature in the city in order to provide benefits to residents1. This includes features such as street trees, gardens, green roofs, community forests, parks, rivers, canals and wetlands. Economic growth is defined as an increase in economic activity as measured by Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Specifically we are interested in whether investment in GI increases GDP compared to what would have happened without the investment. We approached the question in two ways, firstly considering the weight of evidence supporting relevant logic chains and secondly reviewing case studies.