I am a researcher at the University of Manchester. For many years I have been researching the foundational economy – that is, all the important services and systems that we use everyday and which have a big effect on quality of life. This includes food, transport, housing, health and care, energy, education and more. Many of these systems don’t work well for everyone and most of them also need to be renewed and upgraded to make them better suited to meet net zero targets. My interest is in thinking about new policies and actions that can improve the foundational economy in ways that also improve social justice and inequality.