What is a Rural Community Council?

Action Hampshire is Hampshire's Rural Community Council (RCC). Each county in England has an RCC, supporting community-led initiatives in rural areas and championing rural development issues in their area. Action with Communities in Rural England (ACRE) is the umbrella body for the 38 RRCs across England, together forming the ACRE Network (more info at this link). If you'd like to see more about ACRE's plans for the future, view the ACRE strategy for 2025-30 at this link.

As Hampshire's ACRE Network member, Action Hampshire aims to:

• Support community-led planning and rural development in Hampshire
• Increase the long-term sustainability of community life in rural Hampshire
• Influence policies and services, particularly to achieve equity for Hampshire's rural communities

You can see our work in action across the towns and villages of Hampshire through our work with community halls and centres (follow this link) and our Rural Housing Enabling (follow this link). We also champion rural communities across all of our work, including our work on fuel poverty, loneliness, and emergency response. You can read more about our work with rural communities at this link .

Around 75% of Hampshire's landscape is classified as rural. These areas are home to 300,000 people, or 22% of the county’s total population. There is often an assumption that rural communities are better off, healthier, and generally more privileged places to live than our larger towns and cities. While for many in rural areas this may be true, there are also significant pockets of deprivation and disadvantage hidden within our rural communities. For those facing disadvantage of any kind in rural areas, factors such as geographical and social isolation, unemployment and under-employment, poor connectivity, older and less diverse populations, and sparsity of services and facilities not only worsen the issues they face, but also create bigger barriers to overcoming them.

Rural Community Councils were established after the First World War to promote community life in rural England. Action Hampshire became Hampshire's RCC in 1951, when our organisation was formed. Prior to this, in August 1923, Hampshire's Rural Community Council was one of the first five to be established in the country. The first Hampshire RCC established the local CPRE branch, along with providing support to parish councils, village halls, young farmers clubs, and rural industries, receiving an annual grant of £325 from the Rural Development Commission for all this work. Unfortunately, this RCC was forced to close in 1937 and, for 14 years, there was no local RCC in Hampshire. Hampshire received support from the National Council for Social Service in the interim, until Action Hampshire (then named Hampshire Community Council) was established in 1951. We celebrated 100 years of rural community development in Hampshire in 2023, in honour of Hampshire's first Rural Community Council.

Follow this link to read our 'Celebrating 100 years of Rural Community Council Newsletter'