Cities

Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham and Sheffield, known as 'the eight core cities', are leading the way in creating vibrant, lasting communities.

The core city councils work in partnership with other local authorities, representatives of the private sector and other bodies across their cities and surrounding areas - their 'City-Regions'.

A report called State of the English Cities was commissioned by the former Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) which has since been superseded by Communities and Local Government. The report, published in March 2006, highlighted a dramatic transformation in many of our major urban centres and substantial signs of economic recovery, particularly in the eight core cities.

People are moving back in to cities, new jobs are being created and services are improving. But English cities still face difficult challenges and economic performance remains uneven. Cities have the greatest numbers of people out of work and pockets of significant deprivation.

We sponsor regeneration programmes to transform communities across England and aim to make the property market function efficiently and fairly everywhere. To help us promote good practice in urban design, we give funding to the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) and have established an Academy for Sustainable Communities (ASC).

In this section

Related publications

A Framework for City-Regions
- Published: 15 February 2006
- Site: Cities and regions
State of the English Cities
- Published: 7 March 2006
- Site: Cities and regions