John Prescott is planning to thrash out a common European approach to sustainable communities as part of the UK鈥檚 upcoming presidency of the European Union

In a speech last Wednesday, the deputy prime minister revealed his 鈥渂ig idea鈥 to host an informal meeting of ministers from the 24 other members of the European Union in Bristol on 6 and 7 December.

He said: 鈥淲e will use the UK鈥檚 presidency of the EU to discuss a European approach to creating sustainable communities. Such thinking could create a framework to consider the newly emerging regional policy 鈥 not focused on narrow economic objectives, but on achieving sustainable communities.鈥

It is understood that the summit is classed as an informal meeting as it was hurriedly added to the list of meetings that form the UK鈥檚 EU presidency from 1 July, after officials realised that housing and regeneration had been missed off the formal list.

Officials said one of the main goals of the summit would be to agree a common approach to ensuring the range and supply of skills that are necessary to build sustainable communities across the EU.

Prescott added that the summit would seek to build on the 鈥渆conomic prosperity discussed by the EU in Lisbon, environment sustainability agreed in Gothenburg, and the commitment to strong and effective democratic governance decided in Warsaw鈥.

Claire Roumet, secretary general of the pan-EU social housing group CECODHAS, said that the principal aim for the summit should be to address how the 拢10bn in EU structural funding was going to be used to support 鈥渢he sustainable development of neighbourhoods鈥.

She added that the best areas to spend this money were social inclusion and energy efficiency.

Sarah Webb, director of policy at the Chartered Institute of Housing, said: 鈥淭his is a timely idea 鈥 nobody has cracked the sustainable communities agenda but different countries are further ahead in some areas than others so sharing our experiences has got to be useful. We are probably doing more useful work on cohesion than some places.鈥