Saving Lives and Minds: Understanding Social Value and the Role of Anchor Institutions in Supporting Community and Public Health before and after COVID-19

Abstract

There are great disparities in health between places in the UK. People living in poorer areas are dying on average 9 years earlier than in wealthy areas, largely due to regional economic differences, including high unemployment, low wages and social inequality, unrest and injustice that accompany economic disadvantage. Preston in the north-west of England has been developing a community wealth building project known as the Preston Model, which shows signs of successfully increasing and retaining local wealth. The anchor institutions—large local organisations that are ‘anchored’ in places, such as hospitals, universities, housing associations and local government—have developed social value policies and policies of cooperation with their communities that attend to a heightened awareness of corporate social responsibility and enhanced working relationships with local communities in order to turn around local fortunes in an allied economic and health initiative. Corporate social responsibility is the essence of cooperation and cooperatives and is a central feature of the Preston Model. Ultimately, CSR within the Preston Model is concerned with quality employment. The pandemic has highlighted the need for CSR and cooperation. This chapter brings together researchers from the University of Central Lancashire, Lancaster University and stakeholders from two of the anchor institutions—the Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Community Gateway Association—to combine an academic framework, including local responses to interviews and participatory community groups in Preston, with two major anchor institutions as case studies. The chapter will investigate a broad range of initiatives, from directly focussed health policies, such as social prescribing, to wider, ‘softer’ approaches, such as developing participation, cooperation and democracy within and between organisations, groups, teams and communities and the corresponding networking and mutual support systems that may affect greater agency, empowerment and enhanced mental health outcomes among people in Preston and Lancashire, ultimately transferable to other UK regions.