An IMD Report – Wakefield

When new Indices are released authorities often commission reports to analyse and publish the findings – a quick google reveals dozens of councils with their own ‘deprivation reports’ from 2010. Wakefield’s (link) is a good example of what kind of conclusions can be drawn from the data.

The report notes change over time in its national and regional ranking, as Wakefield went from 7th to 8th most deprived authority in its region. More importantly the proportion of its LSOAs in the 20% most deprived nationally went from 35% in 2004 to 31% in 2007 and 29% in 2010, showing consistent improvement relative to the rest of England. It also notes a reduction of people living in a top 10% most deprived LSOA from 47,000 in IMD 2007 to 40,500 in IMD 2010.

It breaks down the Wakefield deprivation picture, noting that the LA scores lower than average on the domains for education, employment and health outcomes but higher than the norm for housing, access to services and the living environment:

The report also studied the changes in deprivation ranking among neighbourhoods and found that although most areas in Wakefield showed an improvement from 2007 this was much more pronounced among the less deprived areas while the most deprived areas showed little positive change, an indication of a widening gap between more and less deprived areas:

 

The report also has a great deprivation map which marks the ‘priority neighbourhoods’ targeted by local policy.

 

Finally, the report looks at how Wakefield’s deprivation ranking might affect its ability to attract external funding, observing that if the Working Neighbourhoods Fund and Neighbourhood Renewal Fund were still active, Wakefield would qualify in 2010 for the latter but not the former. It also notes which neighbourhoods in Wakefield would qualify for the Big Lottery Fund’s community buildings strand and the Sport England Active Women programme.

This is a great example report, featuring analysis of change over time and comparisons at the national, regional and neighbourhood level.