Guidance

Useful resources for further reading (HTML)

Published 2 September 2025

Applies to England

Where can I find out more information?

The community engagement advice notes have been created by Homes England to share ideas and suggestions with local government and their partners.

The advice notes aim to promote meaningful community engagement and support the understanding and delivery of ‘locally relevant social value’, linked to the planning, housing and regeneration development process.

There are many other resources available online which you may find useful to inform the way that your local authority considers social value outcomes and community engagement in your projects. Here is a list of resources freely available online which you may find useful:

Homes England publications

Homes England strategic plan 2023 to 2028 — our plan for how we’ll drive regeneration and housing delivery to create high-quality homes and thriving places.

Homes England: measuring social value — a collection of research reports and guidance designed to inform the measurement of social value to further social justice and the levelling up of communities.

Housing information hub — the housing information hub signposts local authorities and other housing providers to guidance and tools relating to homebuilding, placemaking and regeneration.

New homes fact sheets — a series of key facts and figures on new homes and regeneration, created to support conversations with local communities.

Other useful resources

The empowering design practices project (external website) — Empowering Design Practices

Empowering Design Practices is a collaboration between organisations as a research project on community-led design.

A social value toolkit for district councils (external website) (.pdf) — Local Government Association

This document is written specifically for local government to strengthen social value within procurement and bidding processes.

Better life index (external website) — The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

This index allows you to compare well-being across countries, based on 11 topics the OECD has identified as essential, in the areas of material living conditions and quality of life.

The quality of life framework (external website) — Quality of Life Foundation

This framework has been developed as a tool, for communities in particular, to explore how they can improve their quality of life.

The social value toolkit for architecture (external website) — Royal Institute for British Architects (RIBA) and the University of Reading

The social value toolkit for architecture has been developed to make it simple to evaluate and demonstrate the social impact of design on people and communities.

Make life better by design (external website) — The Design Council

The Design Council is the national strategic advisor for design and has recently focused its efforts on sustainability and future forward thinking.

The social value model (.pdf) and The guide to using the social value model — Government Commercial Function

These documents set out the government’s approach to social value and priorities for procurement. The model sets out 10 steps for how to apply it in practice and how to evaluate tender responses.

Framework for defining social value — UK Green Building Council

UK Green Building Council has published a range of guidance aimed at helping the built environment sector identify a definition of social value that focus on the impact buildings, infrastructure and places have on people and the communities they live in.

A guide for delivering social value on built environment projects — UK Green Building Council

This guide was developed to enable project teams to deliver social value across the project lifecycle.

Delivering social value: community engagement hacked — UK Green Building Council

Actionable advice for public and private sectors, with ideas, examples, and case studies for how to engage people and places.