The Big Society: Opportunity
or Threat
Funded by:
Hosted by:
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
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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
•
•
•
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Market failure
Organisational failure
Loss of third sector unity
Loss of public mandate