People's Empowerment Alliance of Custom House (PEACH)
Key points
- The partnership took a community organising approach to embed resident decision-making and hold decision-makers to account in major regeneration projects.
- Residents successfully organised, influenced and secured permanent, safe and secure homes for social housing tenants and residents in temporary accommodation.
- Community safety was improved through the provision of safe spaces for young people and self-defence classes for women.
About the Big Local area
The PEACH Big Local area was within the Custom House area in the London Borough of Newham, East London. Built in 1855, over the following decades hundreds of thousands of families settled in the area for work. But by the 1980s the London docks had closed, and the Custom House area became one of the most deprived in England (MHCLG, 2019).
In 2021, 14,000 residents lived in this Big Local area (ONS, 2022), many with no qualifications and more likely to work in lower-paying sectors such as healthcare and hospitality than the London average (ONS, 2023a; 2023b). The net annual household income in the area after housing costs was £23,000, lower than the London average of £32,000 (ONS, 2023c). Despite its several parks, residents were exposed to high levels of pollution (CDRC, 2024).
Significant regeneration in the Newham area during the Big Local programme contributed to a 46 per cent increase in the price of flats between 2014–2024 (Land Registry, 2024), which resulted in many residents being priced out of the area. These factors led to many households being unable to move out of overcrowded, well-worn social housing, and many becoming displaced. By 2021, the borough had the highest rate of temporary accommodation in London (Newham Council, 2021).
How the Big Local area approached delivery
The People’s Empowerment Alliance of Custom House (PEACH) Big Local partnership was run by a mostly female membership, with a dozen members between the ages of 25 and 65. The majority were residents of Black African or Black Caribbean ethnicity (as of 2021, 28 per cent of residents were of Black African or Black Caribbean heritage (ONS, 2023d)).
PEACH partnership’s vision was to empower the community, particularly in relation to major regeneration projects in the area. To begin, they ran ‘listening campaigns’ with churches, schools, community groups and on the streets to understand what mattered to residents. Unstable work, inadequate housing, poor health, social isolation, and street violence surfaced as the biggest issues, and residents voted for jobs, housing, safety and health to become the partnership’s priorities.
The following year, the partnership held a launch event, with 140 residents discussing solutions to key issues. This assembly led to the PEACH partnership prioritising community organising, enabling residents to leverage their collective power to influence stakeholders including the local authority, housing providers and developers.
The focus on housing issues meant that most workers appointed by the partnership (around 13 throughout the programme) were community organisers who supported and mobilised small groups of residents to develop proposals and negotiate with decision-makers. These groups organised to improve social housing and influenced regeneration plans for the area. Alongside their community organising work, the partnership also set up events and activities for residents.
The Locally Trusted Organisation (LTO) was a local housing charity until the partnership created a formal organisation, PEACH Inc, and became responsible for managing Big Local funding eight years into the programme. During this period of change they also expanded their community organising work to include the neighbouring area of Canning Town. This new responsibility came with challenges around governance, which were worked through over time through training and with support from Local Trust. In the final years of the programme, there was significant turnover in partnership membership and worker appointments, which alongside a sense of strain after years of hard work reduced PEACH Big Local’s capacity. While still impacted by ongoing regeneration projects in the area, this led to a period of rebuilding, with new partnership members, workers and PEACH Inc directors coming forward to deliver the final phase of Big Local. Towards the end of Big Local, plans were being developed to support tenants in temporary housing.
PEACH Big Local partnership felt their legacy was in the collective voice built among the community. In 2024, they won a Locality Award for their work to secure 60 per cent rent reduction for 250 tenants, a £300,000 rent arrears amnesty, and over £1 million in refurbishment funding.
A Big Local partnership was a group made up of at least eight people that guided the overall direction of delivery in a Big Local area.
A locally trusted organisation (LTO) was the organisation chosen by people in a Big Local area or the partnership to administer and account for funding, and/or deliver activities or services on behalf of a partnership. Areas might have worked with more than one locally trusted organisation depending on the plan and the skills and resources required.
What the Big Local area did
Place-based pride and connection
Bringing the voice of the community to a major regeneration project
Faced with major regeneration in the area, residents were concerned that levels of stable social housing would reduce, displacing more families and disconnecting them from school, family and friends. PEACH Big Local partnership set up Permanent Homes Now, which worked on reducing families’ insecurity by negotiating for temporary accommodation to become permanent, and for well-maintained properties to improve living conditions.
Partnership members also set up a ‘Housing Club’ and supported the residents involved to understand different regeneration models. The group worked with architects, urbanists and people familiar with regeneration to aid understanding and support their work. At its peak, the club had 80 active members who knocked on doors to find out what residents wanted from regeneration, such as local shops and civic spaces. They used this knowledge to create an ‘Alternative Regeneration Plan’ and negotiate with housing stakeholders, including the Mayor of Newham.
Working collaboratively
Negotiating with local stakeholders to secure safe and secure social housing
After decades of living in well-worn council-owned buildings in Custom House, PEACH Big Local partnership members organised for four years to influence the council to end their contract with an outsourced property management company.
Tenants compiled repair dossiers and held protests at the Town Hall and outside the property management head office. Members of the community housing group successfully negotiated directly with management executives and the council, bringing 250 properties back into council management, with a 60 per cent rent reduction for all tenants who were required to move out while repairs were carried out. Within the two years that followed, over 80 properties were refurbished, including five blocks where windows were upgraded to double-glazing. PEACH partnership members also helped to secure a £300,000 rent arrears amnesty.
This collective action inspired tenants to set up Love Custom House Now, a network of representatives drawn from the estates to advocate for repairs, regular maintenance and cleaning up the neighbourhood. Love Custom House Now developed strong communication channels with Newham Council and collaborated with them to produce a report on healthy housing. This relationship led to improved response times for emergency repairs and secured a further £1 million refurbishment commitment.
Local economy
Setting up a cooperative cleaning company to provide stable employment
In response to calls for better quality and more stable work, and to meet business needs, PEACH Big Local partnership developed a Custom House Workers’ Cooperative (CHWC) to run a cleaning company owned and managed by local people. The cooperative brought stable and fairly waged work to the area and, in 2022, had six contracts and around 10 cleaners who could access part-time work around their other commitments. CHWC also employed administrative support to enable cooperative members to work, develop skills and develop the business. CHWC ran for approximately 10 years, closing towards the end of Big Local.
Responding to crisis and urgent need
Supporting a community response to domestic abuse
In response to local incidents and the lived experience of partnership members, PEACH Big Local partnership worked together to reimagine community safety and care, particularly around domestic abuse.
Funding was allocated to a local domestic abuse prevention charity, Sistah Space, to deliver training and support for staff and members. Partnership members also ran community coffee mornings, self-defence classes and women’s groups around safety and health so they could protect themselves and support each other.
Investing in young people
Setting up a youth club to prepare young people for life and improve safety
In partnership with Shipman Youth Centre, PEACH Big Local partnership employed a youth worker to set up Xpand. For seven years, this club provided events and activities for young people aged 16–18 moving on from college or school, into employment and further education. Between 10 and 15 young people took part in each cohort and learned leadership and employability skills, until 2022 when the youth centre closed.
After a local student was tragically murdered, the partnership, Xpand youth club and Shipman Youth Centre identified nine shops in Prince Regent Lane to be used as safe spaces to help any young person who felt in danger. This idea came from young people, who took a leading role in identifying the shops and meeting with shop owners to ask them to join the scheme.
Enabling young people to take the lead in improving their environment
To foster a sense of pride, PEACH Big Local partnership supported Build Up, a charity that puts young people in control of construction projects to encourage them to take ownership of their surroundings. For example, local girls designed a flower bed, fountain, table and chairs to enhance the green spaces where they lived, which developed their confidence and skills.
Towards the end of the programme, they delivered a second project together. This involved residents in workshops around community gardens, with young people informing design and taking part in construction workshops.
Helping parents to better support their children’s education
After speaking to parents at school gates early in the programme, PEACH Big Local partnership’s community organisers realised that many residents in Custom House didn’t have English as a first language and parents needed support to help their children with homework. So, they worked with a local primary school to run a club where parents could improve their numeracy and literacy skills. Between 15 to 30 parents attended each session.
A partnership member and parent also set up a group for parents of children with special educational needs. Called “Let Us Communicate”, the group provided peer-to-peer advice, informed parents of their rights and advised how they could get more support for their children. Eight leaders were trained in community organising and eventually created an accessible Summer School in partnership with local youth groups and services.
How the Big Local area spent their funding
Each Big Local area received approximately £1.2 million (ranging from £1.199 mil to 1.209 mil) to spend over 10–15 years, depending on how much additional funding they accessed from Local Trust to address specific needs. For example, to bring people together at the start of the programme or to access training and support. This has been categorised for areas and at the programme level based on reports received from areas.
Partnerships chose their own priorities and categories for reporting, and were encouraged to use broad categories so they could use the funding flexibly. All areas spent a significant amount of money on ‘Big Local delivery costs’ such as workers’ salaries, stationery and IT equipment. You can find out more about programme level spend in this article. This is how PEACH Big Local told Local Trust they used their Big Local funding.
References
Consumer Data Research Centre (CDRC) (2024) ‘Access to Healthy Assets and Hazards (AHAH): Air quality domain’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Land Registry (2024) ‘House price statistics: Newham for December 2014 to December 2024: Flats and maisonettes’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG) (2019) ‘English indices of deprivation 2019’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Newham Council (2021) ‘Homelessness Review 2021’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2022) ‘UK Census 2021: All persons’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2023a) ‘UK Census 2021: Highest level of qualification: No qualifications’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2023b) ‘Business Register and Employment Survey (BRES): Regional level employment by broad industry group’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2023c) ‘Total annual household income estimate after housing costs: financial year ending 2020’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)
Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2023d) ‘UK Census 2021: Ethnic group: Black, Black British, Black Welsh, Caribbean or African’. (Accessed 13 December 2024)