The Town and Country Planning Association (TCPA) and Andrew Ross are undertaking a project which builds on our existing understanding of the influence of planning on health inequalities and the quality of homes and communities. Our aim is to document emerging new ways of working and influence these by signposting to the established evidence of how planning can contribute to reducing health inequalities and improving health, helping to apply existing (rather than necessarily creating new) evidence and resources, and influencing new ways of working in the context of reforms across England.

There is mounting evidence about what planning can do to help to nudge behaviour change and to achieve public health outcomes through influencing environmental change. Our understanding of health inequalities and the role of planning is rooted in three important reviews on this topic: NICE Health and Spatial Planning Group (now SPAHG), the Marmot Review (2010), and a 2009 review of the health impacts of spatial planning for the King’s Fund and NHS London Healthy Urban Development Unit.

The TCPA and Andrew Ross will write and publish a handbook on how to integrate health into the government’s planning, health and social care reforms, and housing policy, and why they matter. In collaboration with stakeholders and regional partners, the TCPA and Andrew Ross will deliver 5 seminars across England to give planners and public health staff the opportunity to apply the handbook to their own situations, working and governance arrangements.  There will be two distinct outputs:

• A Handbook on how to integrate health into the government’s planning, health and social care reforms, and why it matters, and
• A series of five Regional Seminars across England to engage and give practitioners the opportunity to apply the handbook to their own situation, preceded by a launch event in July at TCPA, London.

The target audience is the Local Authority and Public Health organisations are planning officers, public health professionals on health and well-being boards and clinical commissioning groups, elected members with portfolios on health and well-being, and housing and regeneration officers.

The TCPA is grateful to the Planning Exchange Foundation, NHS Bristol Public Health Directorate, First Ark Group, and the Sandwell Primary Care Trust, Luton Borough Council, and the Hyde Group for their support of this project.

Click here to view the draft brochure,  launch event agenda and booking form

Click on the relevant link below to register online:

Launch event and national briefing
12th July, 13:30pm - 16:30pm, TCPA, London
Register online for the Launch Event at: http://tcpahealthlaunch.eventbrite.co.uk

Bristol and South West practitioners' seminar
17th July, 10:00am - 15:30pm,  Bristol City Council
Register online for the Bristol seminar at http://tcpahealthbristol.eventbrite.co.uk

Gateshead and North East practitioners' seminar
5th September, 13:30 to 16:30, Gateshead
Register online for the Gateshead seminar: http://tcpahealthgateshead.eventbrite.co.uk

Sandwell and West Midlands practitioners' seminar
13th September, 09:30am to 13:00pm, The Centre for Voluntary Action, Birmingham
Register online for the Sandwell seminar at http://tcpahealthsandwell.eventbrite.co.uk

Knowsley and North West practitioners' seminar
26th September, 13:00pm to 16:30pm, Huyton Suite, Knowsley [note change in venue]
Register online for the Knowsley seminar at: http://tcpahealthknowsley.eventbrite.co.uk

Luton and East of England practitioners' seminar       
03rd October, 13:00 to 16:30, NHS East of England, Fulbourn, Cambridge
Register online for the Luton seminar at http://tcpahealthluton.eventbrite.co.uk