The Big Society: Opportunity or Threat

Pete Alcock University of Birmingham

Labour Government Legacy

• • •

Third Sector

Partnership Strategic investment Political profile Growth in public support – 2008: £13 bn; 36% of charity income (England and Wales, Charities, NCVO Almanac, 2010)

Grants and Contracts 2000/1 – 2007/8

General Election Campaign

• • Consensus – welcome third sector….

Public service delivery Community engagement • • Compact Social Investment Bank

General Election Campaign

• • Concerns in campaigning by third sector About impact of recession About public spending cuts Ambiguity over Conservative’s Big Society agenda

Coalition Government – Big Society back…

May 18 – PM and DPM ‘Big Society at the heart of public sector reform…’ July 19 – PM Liverpool Big Society speech – ‘my great passion’

Office for Civil Society

• • • • OCS replaces OTS - retains Cabinet Office role Minister for Cabinet Office – Francis Maude Minister for Civil Society – Nick Hurd House of Lords – Baroness Warsi Big Society advisor – (Lord)Nat Wei

Office for Civil Society

Dropping of ‘Third Sector’ – “that term has now been abolished”, PM • • • Cabinet Office priorities – Making it easier to run voluntary organisations Making it easier for organisations to work with the state Getting more resources into the sector

Building the Big Society

• • New policy agenda for OCS to deliver Big Society Easier to set-up and run charities, social enterprises and voluntary organisations – mutuals taskforce, new Compact Public sector workers to create employee-owned co-operatives - right to provide, right to challenge

Building the Big Society

• • • • Remove ‘red tape’ – market prices for public sector contracts (‘level playing field’) – OCS/BIS taskforce Big Society Bank – from dormant bank accounts (up to £400m) National Citizens Service for 16 year olds (pilot schemes in summer 2011) Big Society Day – workplace volunteering (from civil service to civic service)

Building the Big Society

• • • Train new generation of 5000 community organisers, to become self-funding Devolve power to local government – and drive down to neighbourhoods and communities Four ‘vanguard communities’ – [Liverpool], Windsor and Maidenhead, Sutton, Eden Valley (Cumbria)

Building the Big Society

• • • But other commitments dropped Futurebuilders Capacitybuilders Commission for the Compact • Or cut OCS Strategic partners

Big Society Discourses

Big Society website ResPublica support • • • Nat Wei – Coral Reef analogy sea bed – public services coral growth – social and private enterprises fish – citizens and communities

Big Society Rhetoric

More than Third Sector reform – a legacy to match the ‘welfare state’!

• • Mending ‘Broken Britain’ Remixing the Welfare State

Mending Broken Britain

• • • • Community empowerment What are communities?

Communities can be exclusive Engagement requires time and resources Engagement requires skills and knowledge

Beware the ‘usual suspects’….

Re-mixing the Welfare State

• • • • Restructuring public services Cuts in public expenditure (25%) Private and third sector delivery Market contracting and surpluses Floating off worker co-operatives

Can third sector replace public provision?

Re-mixing the Welfare State

• • • • Rethinking public services Co-production Outcome based commissioning Total place Personalisation

What does this mean for Commissioners and TSOs?

Third Sector Challenges

• • • • • Change in public contracting Cuts in public expenditure Loss of horizontal support Competition with private sector and third sector organisations Collaboration, subcontracting, and restructuring

Public Sector Challenges

• • • • • Cuts in service budgets Competition in commissioning Partnership and collaboration Co-production and shift to front line planning Outcome focused planning

Service Delivery Challenges

• • • • Market failure Organisational failure Loss of third sector unity Loss of public mandate