Our town-wide vision

How we developed our shared vision

The Luton 2040 vision was developed with residents and partners across Luton in 2020, drawing together our shared ambitions for the future of our town, while building on our many collective strengths and overcoming the challenges that we face together.

The vision was developed in response to Luton’s independent Inclusive growth commission, which released its final report in 2019. This report outlined the 12 ambitions for the town based on the unique opportunities and most pressing challenges. In particular, this report identified overcoming poverty and inequality as a central mission that could enable everyone in Luton to thrive, as well as identifying many key assets such as our anchor institutions, our voluntary and community sector and key sectors within our economy such as manufacturing, digital and green industries.

Throughout 2020, Luton Council carried out an extensive consultation with residents and organisations across the public, private and voluntary and community sectors in the town to build on these recommendations and develop a shared vision for everyone to work towards. Throughout the course of this and the consultation with the inclusive growth commission in 2019 and 191 organisations and over 700 residents took part in shaping the Luton 2040 vision.

Throughout these consultations, residents and organisations considered the opportunities and challenges facing our town and told us what mattered to them. This included building a more inclusive economy, improving wellbeing, tackling the climate emergency, giving our young people the best start in life and tackling injustice and inequality. Each of these priorities link back to the central challenge set by the inclusive growth commission around tackling poverty and inequality so that everyone in our town can reach their full potential.

The Luton 2040 vision was first published in October 2020, setting a long term vision for the town with strategic priorities focussed on achieving this. It was agreed that these priorities, as well as our plans to deliver on them, would be updated regularly through continuous engagement with partners and residents throughout our 20-year journey. Residents have the ability to shape these priorities and plans over time, through direct engagement with elected representatives and through participation in our fairness taskforce and citizen’s forums. Partners across the town are also able to shape the direction of the vision through representation on our partnership boards and involvement in a range of partnership networks that drive key work streams within each of our priorities.

Our unifying mission no-one in poverty

At the heart of our town-wide vision for Luton 2040 is a central mission for everybody in Luton to work together to tackle poverty so that all our residents can thrive.

Before we developed the vision, there were around 46 per cent of children in Luton growing up in relative poverty (end child poverty coalition, 2019). By the middle of 2020, this figure had fallen to 39 per cent. However, this had since increased again to 45 per cent by 2021. Although it is still too early to see the overall impact of all of the work we are doing, this initial shift demonstrates the immediate impact that partners across the town have had, as well as the challenges brought by the pandemic, which have exacerbated hardship and inequality.

Over the next five years, we are likely to see continuing challenges that will impact the most deprived residents within our communities, as well as many who are currently above the poverty line. These challenges include the current cost of living crisis, as well as uncertainty for jobs and businesses and the impact of inequalities that have widened during the pandemic. This backdrop has only strengthened the importance of the mission of no-one in poverty at the heart of the Luton 2040 vision.

The council will therefore be committed to working with partners across the Luton system and beyond to protect the most vulnerable residents and households, build resilience in communities and work to tackle the systemic causes of poverty and inequality in the town.

Vision and priorities for Luton 2040

Our town-wide Vision for Luton 2040: Luton will be a healthy, fair and sustainable town, where everyone can thrive and no-one has to live in poverty.

Our priorities for Luton 2040

The five updated priorities for Luton 2040 were agreed by partners at the end of 2022. These priorities are designed to help us to achieve our shared vision for the town and the council is committed to delivering on all five, aligning our Corporate Plan and service delivery with each of these.

Further details on all five priorities, including target outcomes and plans to deliver on each can be found in the Luton 2040 vision document 2023-2028.

Delivering on our shared vision and priorities for Luton 2040 of this report sets out how the council will play its part in delivering on these priorities.

• Building an inclusive economy that delivers investment to support the growth of businesses, jobs and incomes
• Improving population wellbeing and tackling health inequalities to enable everyone to have a good quality of life and reach their full potential
• Tackling the climate emergency and becoming a net zero town with sustainable growth and a healthier environment
• Becoming a child friendly town, where our children grow up happy, healthy and secure, with a voice that matters and the opportunities they need t o thrive
• Supporting a strong and empowered community, built on fairness, local pride and a powerful voice for all our residents