Londoners and Scots top the list of people most satisfied with where they live in Britain

• New research from Demos, commissioned by Legal & General, maps people’s satisfaction with their local areas across the country.
• It finds that despite a strongly stated desire for green space and nature, built up areas see the highest level of Place Satisfaction, while rural areas typically see poorer satisfaction levels.
• Locations in London top the list, while eastern coastal areas of England, and South West Wales come out at the bottom.
• Demos is recommending that an innovative Place Satisfaction Index should be adopted across Government to inform ‘levelling-up’ policy making.
• Demos and L&G have launched a microsite that provides data for every constituency on place satisfaction, and the elements of place that matter most to people locally.

The new research, which surveyed a nationally representative poll of 20,000 adults, captures how satisfied people are with their local areas by measuring people’s priorities against how they rate actual provision, on issues linked to the practical necessities of daily life such as housing, transport, internet access and shopping.

According to the findings, places in London, Scotland, the West Midlands and the North of England rate the highest on the Index as the country’s most satisfied residents. Despite a stated desire for access to green space and nature, these more built up commuter and ‘affluent’ towns see the highest Place Satisfaction, with ‘good local shops’ topping the list of local priorities. Rural areas, on the other hand, typically see poorer satisfaction, with lack of quality transport a particular problem. Residents who are negative about their place are more likely to live in less-built up areas and less likely to be working full-time.

The constituencies that rank in the top 5 of the Index^[1] are:

1. Hackney North & Stoke Newington
2. Islington North
3. Islington South and Finsbury
4. Hackney South and Shoreditch
5. Streatham

The constituencies that rank in the bottom 5 of the Index^[2] are:

1. Sittingbourne and Sheppey
2. Ealing North
3. Hemsworth
4. North East Cambridgeshire
5. Gravesham

The new report, Everyday Places, recommends a number of measures that would help the Government regenerate local areas, including recognising the important role of shops in building a sense of ‘place’ and rethinking the role of suburbs for 21st century living. Demos is also calling on the Government to adopt a similar approach to measure people’s satisfaction of the places they live, in order to inform policy making in this area.

Demos and Legal & General is today [Thursday 29 April] launching a microsite to explore how satisfied every constituency in Britain is about their local place and to highlight the elements of place that matter most to local people. It can be accessed here: places.demos.co.uk

The report also finds that:

• The average place satisfaction index value for the entire population of Great Britain was +26 on a scale of -100 to +100.
• Satisfaction decreases as locations become more rural.
• The experience of people living in city suburbs is the closest to the national average.
• Residents of urban centres share more in common with each other regardless of whether they live in towns or cities, and residents of suburbs share more in common with each other regardless of whether they live on the outskirts of towns or cities.