UK Parliament / Open data

Public Services (Social Value) Bill

Proceeding contribution from Gareth Thomas (Labour) in the House of Commons on Friday, 25 November 2011. It occurred during Debate on bills on Public Services (Social Value) Bill.
I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend. It is precisely because of the concern she has raised on this issue—and the support she received, including from Members of the coalition parties, in Committee—that I propose a revised definition of social enterprise in this new clause. It seeks to provide in legislation the asset lock facility. Central Surrey Health is owned by the nurses and managers who work in it, and it was the first employee-owned spin-out from the national health service—that occurred back in 2006, under the Labour Government. It is a classic employee mutual. The Cabinet Office has confirmed that Central Surrey Health has delivered substantial improvements in quality and efficiency in the services provided. However, it would appear that quality counted for far less in the tendering exercise than the ability to raise capital. The chief executive of Social Enterprise UK, Peter Holbrook, put it as follows:"““If Central Surrey Health, the government's flagship mutual social enterprise, which has demonstrated considerable success in transforming health services, reducing waiting times and increasing productivity can't win””—" in a commissioning contract process—"““what does this say for the future of the mutuals agenda?””" He went on to say:"““Public sector workers will be understandably anxious about spinning out from the NHS and setting up a social enterprise on the back of this news. The government needs to take action to reassure them that they will not be operating in markets weighted against them.””" The thought, consultation and preparation required in a proper strategic review of how to support social enterprises might begin to give those public sector workers the confidence they need to be part of employee spin-outs. The sense that nobody has a proper joined-up grip of how to transform commissioning has perhaps left many public sector workers sadly sceptical about being part of creating an employee mutual. The Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General has bravely pledged that by 2015 the country will have 1 million more public sector workers in mutuals. I have tabled parliamentary questions asking each Department how many applications Ministers have received from employees to run services for which their Department is directly responsible. Sadly, the overwhelming majority of Departments had received absolutely none. A strategy for social enterprises could also explore where and how social enterprises can get the advice, the support and even the training that they need in commissioning, and in the legal and human resources issues that they would face, for example, in respect of TUPE. Where do social enterprises go for that support now? Clearly they can go to the excellent Social Enterprise UK or Co-operatives UK, but are they well enough funded for the scale of the Government's future ambitions? I pose that question in the context of Rise, the south-west social enterprise agency, having decided to close its doors because of a lack of income. As a result, there is understandable concern that Ministers have not thought through the external support required to grow the social enterprise sector. Social Enterprise UK has suggested that there should be more social enterprise hubs offering a combination of business support, shared work space and peer support to support the growth of the sector. That is a very interesting idea, and if there were to be a proper strategy, the Government could explore it in more detail. What thought have the Government given to encouraging the growth of social enterprises to take on tasks that have traditionally been the preserve of the private sector, for example, in the areas of finance or energy? The Government want social enterprises to help them to roll back the state, but have they thought through the opportunities for social enterprises to do more in those traditional private sector areas? Let me give one example. Access to loans and the level of personal debt have been issues of huge concern across the House. Social enterprises that do not need to fund profits for shareholders could offer cheaper loans and could do so in areas where traditional businesses might not operate. Credit unions are a powerful example of the potential in that area. The London Mutual Credit Union, which I believe operates in Southwark and Lambeth, wants to offer a cheaper payday loan in competition with similar private sector products and it would charge far less than the very high rates of interest that private sector payday lenders currently offer. Similarly, we need to see an increase in access to renewable energy. Why can such energy not be generated by social enterprises, with the profits reinvested into the very communities that are home to the sources of such energy? Baywind Energy in the Lake district is one such social enterprise—it is a co-operative. The Government could use the opportunity of a national strategy to set out how they can support, and even whether they would encourage, the growth of social enterprises in areas where big energy and big finance have previously operated largely unchallenged. A proper strategic look at the opportunities for social enterprises outside the public sector might identify new areas of opportunity that well-designed assistance from Government might help to come to fruition. The National Institute of Adult Continuing Education recently produced a sensible and thought-provoking analysis of the role of education and learning in the big society. It makes the perfectly reasonable point that structural inequalities arising from social class, income levels and job status or prospects, and from issues relating to age, gender, race, faith and disability, can present complex barriers to participation in civil society. It also says that inequalities in skills can have a negative impact on levels of civic participation and, thus, on the readiness of some to play a part in forming social enterprises. NIACE highlights the learning needs of public sector employees who want to form a spin-out enterprise, saying that they will need expertise in service design or in understanding different business models. The question that NIACE's work raises is: where will the learning come from to meet those needs? Where will the support come from to meet those educational challenges? Again, a proper, well-thought-through strategy might consider how to ensure that all communities are covered and monitored, and that the characteristics of areas and authorities where fewer social enterprises were being developed were thought about, understood and considered for further support. A strategy would also think through what roles other non-Whitehall players could play in the Government's ambition for more social enterprises. Further education colleges could perhaps play a role in meeting the training needs that I have just described. Key voluntary sector bodies could perhaps offer further support, and NHS trusts, foundation trusts and mutuals that are already part of the third sector in that sense could certainly have a role to play in supporting further NHS spin-outs. A strategy could help to lock in those key non-Whitehall players to help grow the social enterprise sector further.
Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
536 c578-80 
Session
2010-12
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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