A report from Participatory Budgeting expert Yves Cabannes, emeritus professor of Urban Planning at University College London, explores the contribution made by PB to the service provision of cities and local authorities. Published by the International Institute of Environment and Development, the reports abstract says: "Over 1,700 local governments in more than 40 countries are… Read More
Closing the commissioning gap: Supporting social enterprise through Participatory Budgeting
A new blog on the What Works Scotland website highlights the opportunities for stimulating and supporting social enterprise and so plug the leaking of public funding out of a community. Written by Jez Hall of PB Partners, the blog identifies the relationship between participatory budgeting and the recommendations of the Christie Commission, a report in… Read More
50,000 New Yorkers take part in the latest round of Participatory Budgeting
The USA based Center for Effective Government has just published a blog reporting the rapid growth of Participatory Budgeting in New York, since the first time it was trialled there only a few years ago. In 2011 pioneering elected officials of 4 city districts each put $1m of their own discretionary funds into a new… Read More
Fund My Community: $1m dollar online PB launched by Government of South Australia
The Government of South Australia has launched a $1m online programme called ‘Fund My Community‘. That’s Australian dollars so about £500,000. The initiative is part of its ‘Your Say’ programme, and they have created a video to help promote the idea. Through Fund My Community, the Government of South Australian is using participatory budgeting to… Read More
Which parties support a more participatory democracy in the 2015 election?
Politicians like to say they are listening to citizens and around the world participatory budgeting(PB) is shown to be an effective and meaningful way to do just that. As we approach the 2015 election Jez Hall of the PB Partners has done a quick trawl of the parties websites and manifestos. Below is what he… Read More
Improvement Service publishes briefing on participatory budgeting for elected members
With editorial support from PB Partners a new resource for elected members on the opportunities brought by participatory budgeting(PB) has been published by the Scotland based Improvement Service. The Improvement Service (IS) developed an Elected Members Briefing Series to help elected members keep pace with key issues affecting local government. New ideas for more develoved commissioning… Read More
Health in your hands: using participatory budgeting to tackle lung disease in Leicester
In March 2013, Leicester City clinical commissioning group made money available to fund local ideas to prevent or treat lung disease. The CCG invested £80,000 into the project, the first of its kind for a CCG. They wanted to prevent or treat COPD or Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, commonly known as lung disease; an incurable… Read More
Rochdale Residents celebrate with another £47,000 of Our Choice funding
This spring Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH) once again rolled out their award-winning “Our Choice” project, which gives residents control of how money is spent improving their neighbourhoods. £47,000 of funding to thirteen neighbourhoods was up for grabs and only local people could decide how it was spent. Since 2013 more than £120,000 has been distributed… Read More
Dereham goes interactive: the first text-voting PB programme in the UK?
‘InterACTIVE funding’ was part of a recent £50,000 Participatory Budgeting (PB) scheme across Breckland, Norfolk, delivered by local organisations in partnership with the Breckland Pride Board. Cllr Lynda Turner, Breckland Council Executive Member for Community and Environmental Services said: “This is a fantastic opportunity for clubs and organisations that just need a little funding to… Read More
Can participatory budgeting support a more open government?
At a meeting in early March 2015 of the OGP civil society network, Sue Ritchie, acting chair of the PB Network, posed the radical idea of 1% of all public expenditure being decided through an open, participatory democracy process , based on PB best practice around the world. This in turn stimulated a blog by Oliver… Read More
![](http://pbnetwork.org.uk/wp-content/themes/dynamik-gen/images/content-filler.png)