Big Society- How is it going to work?

[seekinginspiration]

I'm really confused. I do a bit of volunteering (two hours a week - but only when it fits in with other demands). I have to put paid work and family first so I need to earn some money. I think most mums and even some grannies are in this situation. How is it going to work?

People aren't going to volunteer because the government tells you it's 'the right thing to do'. I don't think they will rush to fill in the gaps where cuts have removed funding either.

My interpretation of Big Society is that phrase of JFK's about 'ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country'. In my book that means volunteering if you have time, donating to charity if you have cash and anything else you can think of that moves us on from being 'a bunch of individuals expecting things to come from on high' to 'a community that looks out for each other'.

So you're contributing, I contriubute and lots of other people do so as well. Personally, rather than taxing the heck out of the wealthy, I'd like to see 'Big Society' translate as getting the wealthy to (as they do in the US) sponsor charities, set up foundations and contribute practically in that way. The Lottery Fund takes money off people desperate to win a few quid and uses it to good effect. If we could get philanthropy back on the agenda - give bankers a chance to rehabilitate themselves through charitable projects, perhaps? - then I think we could move mountains.

BTW Others will be along to tell you that it's just a way of saying 'government will cut all public service funding and expect volunteers to fill in the gaps'... but I think that view is rather cynical and short-sighted. :)

You could give bankers the chance to rehabilitate but will they take you up on it.

Charities have benefited not through bankers bonuses but through people of modest means having a little extra and giving what they can.

Now most of us are having to cut our cloth and many are being made redundant, many people rightly see the big society as a cynical ploy to make cut backs.

I see it as people getting together to help provide the 'nice to haves' which we would like the govt to pay for but in reality we don't make enough money as a nation.

For example - hot topic of the week - libraries. I would happily donate books to the elderley/children etc. if they couldn't afford them and there was no library in the area or set up some kind of 'community' scheme.

Individuals may be philanthropic but corporations only do it for PR. We don't have many entrepreneurs on the level of Bill Gates in this country.

Are there are more women volunteers than men? I'm suspicious of men exhorting others to help out when they don't even pull their weight at home with child care or cleaning. (With notable exceptions, of course.)

I work for a charity (homestart). We have to work it as a small number of paid staff looking after a larger number of volunteers.

Without the volunteers we simply couldn't function.

due to budget cuts we are looking at reducing staff by a thrid and cutting the hours the rest of us work.
we will therefor have to rely even more heavily on our volunteers. Problem is that as the "big society" cuts start falling into place people are going to be pushed into finding more work thus reducinf the time they have to volunteer.

it is very worrying.

I am already having to look at my waiting list of families and be far more critical of their needs and refuse help to those i think least need it.
it is a horrible horrible situation.

"You could give bankers the chance to rehabilitate but will they take you up on it."

There is a big 'anti-ostentation' movement at the moment in society. Massive backpedal from 00's bling. It's not cool to be flashing it about any more. This is the Aldi Decade. Just today I heard a 'shock' story about the value of the goody bags celebs will be getting at some awards ceremony... thousands, basically. That's not a story that would have even made the headlines as recently as five years ago. My feeling is that we just have to tweak the guilt buttons a little more, maybe offer some tax incentives to nudge it along, and the penitent wealthy will be queuing up to absolve themselves of the sin of accumulation with massive donations.

Can't resist a cynical post...

Penitent wealthy, my eye... Since when does a hugely wealthy person being seen to go shopping in Aldi help anyone? Will probably just push up the prices of cheap tat. And since when can a civilised society be run on the fashions and whims of the rich? As for donations to charity - if wealthy people can opt out of paying tax, but choose which pet charities to support, will we end up with the services and facilities we need, or an awful lot of donkey sanctuaries? It's not as if they have lots of time on their hands to research carefully where help is most needed.

And who is decide who's got enough money to donate and who's got enough time to volunteer? I know plenty of people with neither, lots with at least some money spare to donate, but far fewer with any time, except for those who've just been made unemployed. So I still only see the Big Society working by getting librarians to do work unpaid that they previously did paid, etc. Good way of avoiding the minimum wage, though, to get the "unemployed" to work for nothing. Oh, and great to take advantage of the community-minded-and-already-overworked.

" will we end up with the services and facilities we need....."

We will if the bodies responsible (& the appropriate ministers) make a good case and lean on the right people hard enough. In future, rich people that don't donate big sums to charity or actively contribute in some other way I would suggest will find themselves villified. (And they don't have to shop in Aldi, of course... :) )

And you ask 'who is to decide'? That's the thing.... no-one decides on other people's behalf because it's down to all of us to make it happen. I'll admit it's a scary concept after 13 years of the 'pay your tax and leave it all to us - we know best' philosophy of the last administration.

BTW Think the unemployed will be finding themselves persuaded into taking the next job rather than being asked to volunteer...

We will if the bodies responsible (& the appropriate ministers) make a good case and lean on the right people hard enough

This is all arse-about-face

Rich people lean on ministers not the other way around.

Thats why private companies are offering to take Dave's not so willing volunteers as slave labourers

This is just my interpretation of a Big Society future, you understand... a world where there is a return to social obligation on the wealthy to support good causes and participate in the community in a bigger way than simply coughing up the minimum taxes due. In the Victorian days when the churches were powerful they could twist the moral knife by reminding them about rich men, camels and eyes of needles. Dickens invented Scrooge - the miser that was redeemed by good works. And, as a result, we had whole cities - hospitals, libraries, parks - built from scratch with donations from generous benefactors.

It may be arse-about-face but it makes more sense to me than the slightly silly idea that unemployed people will be made to stack books for no money...

BTW. I know it's as fashionable around here to support a government initiative as it is to admit to still owning the Gary Glitter back catalogue but, without a little variety of political opinion, all 'Big Society' threads immediately turn into a whining 'I'm not volunteering', all tories are bastards, bah humbug, misery-fest. :)

It's not.

You will get the sack and then be asked to do your job as a volunteer. Big Society = BS

These threads certainly would be boring if everyone agreed that the Big Society is either a silly or a cynical idea.

It's the chill of the thought that we would be returning to Victorian attitudes, without the obscene wealth of Empire behind them, that makes me cynical. I thought it was the Victorian era which taught us that leaving it all up to the private sector only results in change when entire slums of workers are dying of typhoid and cholera, making it very inconvenient for the factory owners to keep having to deal with sickly staff dropping dead and therefore not turning up to work. And the Churches were very successful at bringing money into their coffers, but not necessarily all so good at passing said money on to those who most needed it. Churches were far better maintained, as were vicars, in those days, though.

Surely change will always be greeted with cynicism when people openly say they can't get the rich to do what they ought to do, because the rich don't want to pay tax and are powerful enough to ensure they can avoid it, they don't, in fact, give much of their money away to charity either, or volunteer for anything (far too busy), but the rest of us ought to change our behaviour to make up for it? Maybe if we saw the evidence of armies of wealthy people getting their hands dirty and donating large proportions of their income to charities, we wouldn't be so cynical.

Yes Chilli it would be boring if everyone agreed.

I don't think the conservatives can claim to conserve whilst also forging ahead with less traditional ideas such as same sex marriage in church. In fact what message they are conveying to one and all is confused.

I'm not sure that I want to see a return to the victorian model where many children were only educated for 2 years, unless wealthy benefactors provided a school and teaching staff, or doctors visits had to be paid for, hundreds living in slum conditions, the poor sent to the workhouse.

Infact many very bright people in opposition to the big society have pointed out the similarity with the work house. Make people unemployed and then force that labour upon them in an unpaid capacity.

Run an entire area down to the ground, take away front line services, put social workers, care workers and council staff out of work and then apply to their goodwill and make them work for nowt!

It simply won't work,anybody with a brain not into empty headliners can see that.

I volunteered a lot last year but have had to practically stop due to me needing to work more due to the cost of living going up. When we loose our CB I will have to stop completely. I think many,many other people will do the same,I know many already.

I also know many who will refuse to do any on moral grounds ie I refuse to volunteer a job somebody has just been turfed out of. As others have said on previous threads, that is no better than being an 80s scab-it's wrong.

My sister works has a very highly skilled job in a huge charity,she's very well qualified and highly skilled in her field,written books etc. She is in daily fear of loosing her job at the moment. Now personally as a mother I'd far rather have my sister dealing with my family if they had the condition she's an expert in than a volunteer which is what the alternative will be.

I also don't want local groups with buggar all expertise and their own agenda running my forests,libraries etc.I don't want volunteers teaching my kids in school I want trained qualified TAs on a payroll,I don't want any Tom Dick or Harry caring for my aged parents...... and so it goes on.

The Tories won't have to put up with second rate services they'll simply go private so it's neither here nor there for them that this is just going to be a total nightmare with unqualified,untrained,unaccountable people with their own individual agenda bickering over our local services.

As I said previously just getting parents to run our local pre-school was a nightmare and it had a direct impact on their lives. Most members of this gov have no experience in this what so ever having done diddly squat volunteering,community work themselves. I suspect if the gov had had the experience many of us in the real world have had they'd see this idea for what it is-total twaddle probably dreamt up in the Eton common room years ago.

In answer to the OP - it isn't. DC and chums are about as far removed from a working person as could be possible.

I volunteer, so does my DH and I know others who volunteer. That will remain the same as. Unless of course Cameron want's more of us to volunteer. Which isn't a bad thing.

Rabbitstew. There's nothing wrong with Donkey Sanctuaries. You reminded me that my direct debit to the Donkey Sanctuary in Sidmouth has expired! It's a great charity to donate to, and the donkeys are a great deal more intelligent/preety, than any asinine politician in Westminster!!

complimentary - Dave wants us to volunteer to take on positions which people are currently trained, employed and paid to do. He's not after beaver leaders.

AS far as I can tell...

All the librarians/TAs/other lowly-paid public sector workers (predominantly women) will be sacked.

And then they will be asked to volunteer in their old jobs.

Bloody genius, isn't it?

Complimentary - did you use the word asinine as a joke or was it by accident? It made me smile, anyway.

And if he was after Beaver leaders he'd struggle.

It's yet another local service nobody wants to do,constantly at risk of closing even though our own dc enjoy it.

People are knackered after work,many of us are working longer hours and in more stressful conditions due to staff cutbacks.

If you can't get people to run clubs for our own children it's going to be a struggle to get people to reliably volunteer and help out other people's kids,old folk etc.

but if you don't volunteer to do your old job for free, you won't get benefits I'll bet...

Pretty not preety!
Coldtits.
Asinine. I knew it was somehow connected to donkeys!

"Writing in The Observer, Mr Cameron insisted that ministers are opening up billions of pounds of Government contracts so that charities and social enterprises can compete for the first time"

The news today! so is this the Condems plan to privatise all public services. Is it more pallitable just because charities will be bidding against private companies motivated by profit.

When Dave and co talk about competition, it is with the purpose of driving down costs. Which is fine on the surface, but if you stop to think, this will be met by personal cost, to service users and to the lowly paid employees and the ever increasing use of "conscripted" volunteers.