Politics and architecture

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Health buildings should be airy and uplifting like Avanti Architects’ ACAD Centre in west London, pictured – not tightly packed megastructures such as Kier’s Hairmyres PFI hospital

“There are votes in architecture.”

This bald assertion begins the RIBA’s new invigorated manifesto for architecture, which it launched this week, in good time for the general election. In it, the institute argues that architecture wins votes because it governs the quality and safety of our hospitals, schools and neighbourhoods, expresses our values as a society and, as part of the £100bn construction sector, it helps to drive Britain’s economy.

Well, the RIBA would say that, wouldn’t it? But do the candidates running for parliament and the public who vote for them also regard architecture as a vote-winner? And if so, how does it compare with such perennial public concerns as the resourcing and management – as opposed to the design – of hospitals, schools, transport and housing?

One of the very few surveys of voter opinion on architecture was carried out by MORI in 2002. More than 1000 people were asked whether a significant improvement or decline in their local environment would make them “more inclined” to switch their vote to a different party at the next council election.

Forty-five per cent said yes – which would be enough to decide just about every election in history. But that assumes there are no changes in any other election issue, and it concerns local government elections, not a general election.

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Prescott sees prefabrication as the saviour of housing, as in Proctor & Matthews’ microflats in south London, pictured. Bellway reverted to dismal type for the first phase of Barking Reach

On the other hand, if it is doubtful that good public buildings win votes, it is probable that bad ones lose them – the Scottish parliament fiasco has already been blamed for John Prescott’s defeat in the referendum over whether to set up devolved regional government in the North-east. And ask yourself whether people would be deterred from voting for the Labour party if government-backed buildings, housing and public spaces gained a reputation for being ugly, shoddy and inefficient. It is worth remembering the adage that oppositions never win elections, governments lose them.

As regards the attitude of Westminster politicians, Christine Russell, Labour MP and secretary of the parliamentary group on architecture and planning, strikes an ambivalent note. “Architecture is becoming an election issue in a minor way,” she says, although more in reference to the question of whether or not to demolish large swaths of terraces in northern Pathfinder schemes. As for the MPs themselves, she says: “I don’t think architectural design impinges on the consciousness of most of them, as compared with, say, crime. There are 659 MPs, all with different priorities, and many have very little interest in local development. They just bat it back to the town hall and local councillors.”

The importance of aesthetics

But if the RIBA was being a shade over-optimistic about the importance of architecture to the voting intentions of the British public, there is no doubt that is becoming more important in the setting of the national mood. For the public at large, architecture has lost its automatic association with damp grey high-rises and despoiled city centres and has become a major crowd-puller.

The live television broadcast of the Stirling Prize attracts audiences of 1.5 million, comparable to that of the Bafta awards, and architecture-related programming has become a staple of prime-time television, from Grand Designs on Channel 4 to Jonathan Meades on the BBC.

A new generation of schools can be exciting places to learn, as in Kingsdale School, south London, refurbished to de Rijke Marsh Morgan’s designs (pictured).
Yet depressing learning boxes are still thrown up, as at Bishop Challoner Boys School in London Docklands

And although MPs may have difficulty seeing the connection between design and their chances of re-election, the government has a good track record of promoting architectural and Urban Design. It adopted Lord Rogers’ urban taskforce report promoting urban renaissance in 1999, launched a campaign for better public buildings a year later and appointed a minister as architectural champion in each department. Also in 1999, it set up CABE with a wider remit than the old Royal Fine Art Commission and a budget now running at just over £11m a year. The Scottish parliament will follow suit next month when it sets up Architecture and Design Scotland as “the national champion for good architecture, design and planning in the built environment”.

The government’s revised planning legislation, which came into force in January, has entrenched architectural design in the British constitution in a way that should have a big impact at local level. For the first time, the planning rules state that architectural design is a statutory criterion for determining planning permission for development projects. Labour’s Russell, who formally served as planning chair for Chester council, says: “Before, it was almost impossible for local authorities to turn down totally mediocre schemes on design grounds. Now at last they can do that.”

Among backbench MPs and Lords, “interest has certainly grown in the subject since the architecture and planning group was set up in 2000”, according to Russell. “There are 150 members and we have four or five meetings a year, with up to 50 turning up. We’ve had presentations from Lord Rogers, who draws the crowds in, and from several ministers. And 18 months ago we had a very popular seminar in which excellent young architects such as Julia Barfield and Bill Dunster gave innovative ideas on how to solve London’s housing crisis.”

On the local government front, the Bilbao effect – the catalytic effect of Gehry’s amazing Guggenheim Museum on a rundown industrial city – has made its mark on local politicians in the UK. So argues Les Sparks, who as CABE’s regional chairman has done the rounds of local authorities to promote good design. “They can see how successful towns and cities parade exciting new places and buildings, and they aspire to be seen to be doing likewise. It’s quite a change from 10 years or so ago, when councillors were wary of new architecture, and went for pastiche and conservation instead.”

City, district and county councils are all busy rediscovering their civic role by appointing prominent architects, such as Sir Terry Farrell and Piers Gough, as architectural champions to encourage good design. Cities such as Manchester, Gateshead, Portsmouth and now Liverpool have all actively encouraged and partly funded landmark buildings as flag-wavers for their cities. And following on from the transformation of Trafalgar Square by Foster and Partners, the Greater London Authority has embarked on a programme to improve 100 public spaces across the capital.

So with support from national and local government as well as the public at large, are we seeing a new dawn for architecture? Very likely. But then good design is like motherhood and apple pie: everyone supports it. Good architecture that is actually built on the ground – where it really counts – is another matter.

Here Rogers, still chairman of the urban taskforce, is witheringly critical of the government’s strategy – or lack or it – for delivering high-quality urban development. “There is no proper policy framework for design excellence: there are too many organisations, with too little focus on delivering quality,” he wrote in the run-up to the government’s sustainable communities summit in February. “To construct cities around the belief that urban design and the public realm can be considered once land deals, planning policy and economic viability have been settled, is to submit our cities to a form of vandalism from which few will recover.”

Which brings us back to architecture as an election issue. Whichever government inflicts architectural vandalism on our cities, as Rogers alleges, can count on losing votes when the building dust has settled.