No evidence institution for social connection, loneliness and civic health

The What Works Centre for Wellbeing closed on 30 April 2024, taking the Campaign to End Loneliness (hosted since 2021) with it; both websites are now static archives. DCMS's loneliness team was repurposed in 2020 and ministerial focus has faded. The £34.5m Know Your Neighbourhood Fund, the largest recent experiment in volunteering/loneliness interventions in 27 deprived areas, ended in March 2026 with its evaluation published but no institutional owner to carry findings forward. The Jo Cox Foundation's policy group and academic centres partially cover, but nothing synthesises evidence, sets standards or advises funders at national scale.

Government and funders are about to spend billions on neighbourhood renewal (Pride in Place, Community Wealth Fund) whose stated aims include social connection, with no institution able to say what works. Evidence from a decade of loneliness programmes is fragmenting exactly as demand for it peaks.

A What Works Centre for Social Connection and Civic Life with 10-year endowed funding (ESRC + DCMS + foundations, mirroring other What Works Centres), formally owning the KYN evidence base, Community Life Survey analysis, and evaluation duties written into Pride in Place and Community Wealth Fund delivery.

// Build together: Counterparty: ESRC/DCMS as endowment co-funders; evaluation duties inside government programmes require them at the table.

Government is spending billions on neighbourhood renewal with no institution to say what works, while a decade of loneliness evidence orphaned by recent closures fragments and needs a home now.