About This Project

Shared Intelligence was commissioned to map the action being taken by the Greater London Authority and the eight English Mayoral Combined Authorities (MCAs) to address health inequalities. Based on interviews and workshops with practitioners in the different areas, we identified a spectrum of involvement in public health matters. Even though an authority’s position on this spectrum reflects the history and powers of the mayoral authorities, all of the authorities were involved to an extent, irrespective of whether they had formal responsibilities. Using soft power and playing a convening role has been critically important in driving action on health inequalities. This may be through adopting a region wide strategy, pursuing specific initiatives on issues such as homelessness or air quality, or through using strategic powers in transport, economy or regeneration to influence the wider determinants of health. The message is that the mix of a mayoral combined authority’s scale, powers, capacity and influence are very important for adding value to the activities of local public service partners in reducing health inequality.