This week, Hope not Hate published its annual Fear & HOPE report, just a few months after far-right riots spread across towns and cities like mine this summer. As a Labour and Co-operative MP and supporter of Hope not Hate, I believe the report is clear that we face a defining moment to build resilient communities and that community ownership must be part of the answer.

Hope not Hate identifies three characteristics that define a resilient and cohesive community – social connectedness, resource availability and agency and empowerment. I believe community ownership has a role to play in all three.

Community ownership is at its most fundamental level about bringing people together. People who own assets are connected, both to the community and to each other. They share responsibility for the most important aspects of community life, working together to create and nurture spaces that benefit and welcome everyone. They make decisions as a collective, uniting around common values.

And when community power works well, it also gives communities access to physical spaces they wouldn’t otherwise have. Across the country there are stories of community assets on the brink of closure – community centres, pubs, sports clubs and libraries that can’t afford to stay open but are saved by community ownership. These physical assets provide spaces for people, including those not involved with the day-to-day running, to come together.

Community ownership means the local mums and babies class has a space to meet, that community kitchens can be set up for cultures to be shared, that young people have a space that is safe and welcoming. Community ownership is already proving that it can provide that social connectedness we need.

Resource availability, or the lack thereof, has been one of the defining challenges of communities in recent years. The brutal impacts of austerity on local government and its ability to provide services has in many places left communities themselves with no choice but to step up. We saw this in the mutual aid projects that developed through the pandemic and in ‘warm banks’ set up to help families through the winter, but also in those assets owned by the community, providing services that have otherwise been stripped away.

And finally, if we believe resilient communities must have both agency and empowerment, then there is no better model than community ownership. Local people involved in community-owned projects have a democratic say in how they are run. It’s not short-term consultation or going through the motions, it’s a direct influence over every decision that is made. It means that assets are operated not by distant shareholders concerned by profit margins, but by those who rely on and care most about their future. It provides agency and empowerment that isn’t fleeting or hollow, but meaningful.

August’s riots may have been an early moment in this Labour government’s term, but it must also be a defining one. Hope not Hate rightly refers to the riots as a watershed moment – the growing, ugly influence of the far-right was brought into sharp focus, and now we cannot go back.

There is huge appetite for government policy that strengthens and empowers communities. The vast majority of Hope not Hate’s respondents say they want the government to step in and take steps to improve cohesion in our communities. And alongside its stark warnings, the report is also clear that people feel a huge amount of pride in their communities and want them to thrive.

The work must now begin to seize that pride and build communities that are powerful and resilient. Community ownership delivers on the three pillars defined by this report, and now is the moment to take it seriously as a tool for building cohesion in the wake of this watershed moment.