Notes and recommendations from session 1 of Eco-town Challenge

The Eco-town Challenge was established to challenge and encourage promoters of eco-towns to develop and improve their proposals and to inject new thinking and expertise.

The Eco-town Challenge Panel has now met with every eco-town promoter (and local authority representatives for the majority of locations). This document is a record of the first session of the Eco-town Challenge and includes a series of recommendations from the Challenge Panel to promoters of eco-towns. Some of these reccomendations apply to all the eco-town schemes; others relate to specific schemes.

The Panel's observations and reccomendations are an independant view. They are based on the Panel's interpretation of the Government's vision for eco-towns and panel member's own views on how the proposed schemes could deliver this.

The Panle's reccomendations are not binding and promoters are free to decide how they respond. However, any subsequent improvement in promoters' development proposals would be viewed positively in the assessment process.

The Challenge Panel has no responsibility for assessing proposals or judging the relative merits of proposals. This will be for Government and Minsters will make the final desicion on locations and schemes with potential to go forward as eco-towns later this year.

The focus of the Eco-town Challenge Panel is to help raise the standard of every proposal, in order to maximise the potential for eco-town development in every location. This supports the Government's ambition for eco-towms to demonstrate exemplary standards.

The Panel will convene for a second time in July. This will be an opportunity for the eco-town promoters to explain how they are responding to the Panel's reccomendations and for the Panel to provide further encouragement and expert advice.