Loss of community spaces helped far-right ignite summer riots, new report says
The loss of community spaces - including youth clubs, leisure centres and pubs - have left areas vulnerable to the influence of the far right, a new report has suggested a year on from last summer’s riots.
The trouble, which spread through parts of Yorkshire, should have been a “wake-up call”, the author of the report said.
More than 1,000 people were arrested as violent disturbances rippled across the country after three girls were killed in an attack in Southport, Merseyside, on 29 July last year.
In Rotherham, thugs attempted to set alight a hotel that housed asylum seekers, leading to more than 150 years of jail sentences handed down.
Around 60 officers, three police dogs and a police horse were injured in the disorder outside the Holiday Inn Express Hotel, in Manvers.
There were also confrontations between protesters and the police in Leeds and Hull.
The far-right “capitalised on Southport’s disrepair to sow disorder”, the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) said, as the paper it commissioned noted a “fight for investment in local amenities has garnered little attention” in the aftermath.
The report warned of a “pincer movement of abandonment and gentrification” which has gradually seen community spaces, such as the Southport pier which closed in 2022, lost and increased isolation of people in many areas.
Referring to previous research, the report said 50 UK pubs close for good each month and an estimated 600 youth clubs shut between 2012 and 2016.
In Rotherham, a number of pubs have closed in recent years. The Corn Law, in High Street, closed on Boxing, while the Hive shut last October.
Hull is the most deprived part of Yorkshire and the Humber, with more than one in five households being in poverty, followed by Bradford, Rotherham and Barnsley.
There are dozens of shops in the city centre that are boarded up and last year, the William Gemmell social club, formerly known as The Humber St Andrews, shut its doors for good.
IPPR has suggested a “21st-century welfare fund” raised through a so-called Amazon tax, whereby warehouses and distribution centres are subject to higher levies or online sales taxes.
It argued online retailers which build “giant structures” – a demonstration of their high value – often do not contribute “sufficiently to the communities around them”.
Amazon has plans to build a new fulfillment centre in Hull as part of a £40bn investment in the UK.
IPPR said a tax on companies with revenues over £1m could help generate “larger, more sustained resources for communities than current community regeneration efforts”, it said.
Report author Dr Sacha Hilhorst said: “The Southport riots were a wake-up call – a stark reminder of what can happen when communities lose the places that once brought people together. In the absence of shared spaces, misinformation and hate can fill the void, creating tinderbox conditions for violence.
“Rebuilding local infrastructure isn’t just about nostalgia – it’s a vital bulwark against division and the dangerous pull of the far right.
“But communities are not apathetic. They are crying out for places to gather, to organise, and to belong. We need a new generation of institutions to help them do just that.”
It comes as Nigel Farage has claimed Britain is on the edge of further unrest, and said “nothing would surprise” him if there were more riots.
The Prime Minister’s official spokesman said improving community cohesion “has been a core part of the Government’s agenda for the past year”.
“Our plans for neighbourhoods will deliver billions of pounds investment over 10 years in hundreds of the most deprived areas to restore pride in people’s local areas,” he added.