‘Community Right to Buy will give local people the chance to run pubs, clubs, halls, pitches and playgrounds,’ says Peckham MP

By Miatta Fahnbulleh

26th September 2025

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Miatta Fahnbulleh

Walk down Rye Lane or through Burgess Park and you see that Peckham’s creativity and energy spill out of every corner – from barbershops to street markets to community kitchens.

But you also can’t ignore the number of empty community buildings that exist in our community. From youth clubs that gave young people purpose, to pubs that acted as a hub for the local community and swimming pools where generations learned to swim. From rehearsal spaces, adventure playgrounds, to social clubs – many of our community spaces have been chipped away.

When the Conservatives slashed local government funding, it was always these places that went first.

The result has a real impact on community: kids climbing back into schoolyards in the holidays just to find somewhere to play, pubs and community spaces closing, parents searching for safe, affordable options that no longer exist.

That is why the Government’s new English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill, which is being debated in Parliament this week, matters so much to our local community.

The Bill is a landmark moment: the biggest shift in power from the government to local communities in decades.

Crucially, the Bill makes two big changes that will benefit communities in Peckham, and across the country:

First, it creates a Community Right to Buy.

If places like pubs, libraries or youth clubs are sold off, the community will have the right to step in and buy them first – to take ownership, protect it, and run it in the community interest.

Second, it automatically protects sporting assets – football pitches, swimming pools, leisure centres – as community assets.

In Peckham, where I have seen the benefit that local sporting facilities can bring to communities and young people, that protection is priceless.

Importantly, even long-closed venues can be given a second life: if they matter to a community, they can be protected and reopened.

For too long, communities have had to fight against the odds to save the places they love. This Bill flips the odds in their favour.

I know that these rights can unlock real benefit for our community.

In Peckham there are already so many brilliant examples of locally run projects. From Westminster House Youth Club pioneering youth-led solar projects, to the Walworth Living Room serving free meals and offering mental health support, to local markets reinventing themselves as cultural hubs – these are proof that community-run spaces deliver more than just four walls.

The difference now is that communities are being given the power to protect and eventually own community spaces for these kinds of initiatives.

For Peckham, that means local residents, not distant developers, shaping our future.

It means grassroots groups have the power to take over disused halls and turn them into youth hubs, training centres, or creative studios.

It allows the community to protect music venues, adventure playgrounds, pools and social clubs for future generations, to be run by the local community in the local community’s interest.

If we get this right, the boarded-up doors of youth clubs could reopen.

The fear of losing beloved pubs, pitches, and pools could fade.

The challenge now is to seize this opportunity. Because community power is not handed down; it is claimed, organised, and defended. And in Peckham, we know better than most how to do exactly that.

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‘Community Right to Buy will give local people the chance to run pubs, clubs, halls, pitches and playgrounds,’ says Peckham MP

Miatta Fahnbulleh

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