Felixstowe Radio

The Community Empowerment White Paper was launched yesterday by the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, see http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/communities/communitiesincontrol . The white paper includes the following announcements:

A new £70 million “Community Builders” fund will be established to support community-led organisations – in particular neighbourhood based ‘community anchors’ according to Phil Hope – to help them offer local community facilities, deliver local services, and be run as ‘economically viable social enterprises without being perpetually dependent on grant funding’.  The fund incorporating £11m from the Office of the Third Sector and £59m from CLG and comprising 70% capital and 30% revenue, will be delivered by a national partner selected through a tendering process.  The fund is expected to open for applications in April 2009.

A new duty for councils to respond to petitions will be introduced in 2009.  Councils will have to respond to petitions (including electronic petitions) in relation to local authority functions or other public services where Council shares delivery responsibility.  The White Paper indicates that petitions could be applied on subjects ranging from the use of empty properties to the transfer of buildings to the community or a new school crossing. Importantly, the council’s overview and scrutiny committee will be able to secure a debate of the full council if it decides the response is not adequate or substantive.  The proposed threshold after which a petition leads to a full council debate is set by the White Paper at five per cent of the local population signing the petition.  However the Paper notes that local authorities will be able to set lower thresholds.

CLG will also consult on a new right to petition that would hold local officers toaccount. The proposition set out in the White Paper is that if enough people served by a local service or agency sign a local petition, senior officers working for a local public body should be required to attend a public hearing such as overview and scrutiny.

All local authorities will be encouraged to use participatory budgeting by 2012. CLG will publish a National Strategy on participatory budgeting later this year to set out how the government’s aspiration to have participatory budgeting in all local authorities will be achieved.

A specialist asset transfer unit will be established by the autumn within the third sector. The new Asset Transfer Unit (ATU) will provide information and expertise on the transfer of publically owned assets to community management or ownership. It will build on the work of the Advancing Assets for Communities programme, led by the Development Trusts Association and its partners, and step up the number of asset transfers in line with the recommendations of the Quirk Review. The Quirk Team is expected to make further recommendations in the autumn.

A new Social Enterprise Unit will be launched within the CLG in the autumn to champion the knowledge and expertise of social enterprises.

A £7.5 million empowerment fund will replace the CLG’s proposed strategic partners programme and provide support for existing national third sector organisations operating across England . The fund will focus on national organisations “helping local communities turn key proposals into practical action on the ground in areas such as community leadership, involvement in planning and social enterprise.” A consultation is being launched alongside the White Paper, with a commitment to launch the fund in late 2008.

A ‘Community Allowance’ allowing community organisations to pay people on benefits to do work that strengthens their communities without it affecting their benefits is being discussed by the Create Consortium, DWP and CLG, with an aim to pilot the idea.

Where legislative change is needed (e.g. petitioning) proposals in the White Paper will be progressed by CLG through the planned Community Empowerment, Housing and Economic Regeneration Bill (CEHER Bill), which will be introduced during the 2008-09 session.

Our response was:

As often is the case the spirit is willing but the devil is in the detail.

Para 11: Councils remain at the heart of local democracy: unfortunately that's not true. Councils have grown too powerful. Senior officials move from place to place, following a career pathway that scant regard for the people they serve. They have become too bureaucratic, and too expensive to manage. Our county CEO is paid £218,000 a year - to do what? Follow the instructions of unpaid councillors? She makes few real business decisions, and cannot be compared with the demands found in commerce and industry.

12. Duty to promote democracy is a fine principle, but the details destroy the intention. We've just held a public consultation, spread over two Saturdays, 9-5pm, to enable folk to contribute to a Neighbourhood (Parish) Plan. Nine people attended - despite having distributed over 1,000 flyers, and promoted in newspapers, shop windows etc. What's gone wrong? People don't feel they have any power.

How will we ever persuade 5% of the electorate to sign a petition? In any case what then happens? A council official is forced to appear before a Scrutiny Committee: so what? Can they sack that official for incompetence? Council officials should publicly justify all the decisions they make that are questioned. Conkers falling off trees are considered dangerous - who says so? Put that council official before the cameras and make them justify that decision.

14. A course to show us how to take part? To what end? That sort of training should be participatory - helping citizens do something, not telling them how it can be done. Such courses waste public money.

15. I love the idea of a fund to help - but we run a local community radio station where getting grants seems impossible. It takes days to prepare the application, you must fit the categories the funder wants, amd we've had so many refusals we've stopped applying. For a small group filling in 20-page forms, sending in three-year accounts, business plans, mem and arts, ensuring CRB checks, health & safety requirements are met and all the other paraphenalia means we don't have the time to provide the service we want to provide. We sent off five applications to our council recently - each was refused, with no explanation - even though we've now asked three times.

16. Yes please we'd like to make our views known in your survey - and we serve the whole community, not one sectional interest.

17. Climate change is complex - the schemes suggested are just palliative.

19-23 We'd suggest supporting local community radio: there are now over 300 local stations. Most are struggling with few funds. Given proper support (part of the licence fee) we can become a cheap, sustainable, enjoyable way of building communities and spreading information. Right now we are broadcasting/podcasting 15-minute programmes for HM Revenue and Customs. This week's subject is tax credits, explained in detail. Mixing business with pleasure we build audiences.

The belief that we are all desperate to know that the hospital 150 miles away provides a better service than our own is fatuous. Instead concentrate upon improving the basic standards locally - many of our NHS services are now being located miles away - at what overall cost to the community as patients and visiors now travel miles?

24-26 Petitions are a reactive process. By the time they are necessary the damage is done. Opinions are entrenched and the decision makers defensive. The process is doomed. We need a pro-active process where local communities build plans, and budgets can then be agreed and allocated within a dialogue that is open.

Locally we have a dispute over housing. LA says government insists they must build houses. There's no local evidence that we need houses. A protest group is set up. They attend a council meeting, in a hall holding 100 people, leaving 400 standing outside. Nobody is allowed to speak. The decision has been taken. Further consultations are finally agreed - to take place 15 miles away in the council offices. The public must 'select' a speaker, allowed to talk for three minutes but only about specific subjects. That's consultation? That's why nobody has any faith in the local democratic process.

26 disregards the whole concept of democracy. We will make the decisions. You will protest. We will take cognisance of your petition and do nothing? Pure tripe!

27-28 No comment. Here, have a sticky toffee for being a good boy. No, not all of you, just this little lad in the front whose ticket came out first.

29-34 Come tell our council, who have refused support for Parish Plans, will not look at Market Towns, and shudder at the very idea of public participation.

35-37 Older folk, in droves, should be encouraged to get involved in local decision making. They have time and wisdom, and tend not to make rash decisions in response to current panics. The elder has always played a significant part in society - until recently.

38-41 The current fixation with measurability and standards is no more than a simplified method that allows responsibility to be pushed further down the tree. A target is set. Often one that is not achievable. Those set that target then attempt to manipulate the statistics so that it appears they are conforming. Time and energy are wasted - they both mean it costs money. This is an application of Game Theory that should be rejected - it does not work.

42-47 Oh dear, we don't know the answer so we'll have a review.

48-51  We have got to the stage in this country where racial divisions should be ignored. We are all people, and with some silly exceptions the English accept newcomers with good grace. We care not about colour, we do care about inclusion. This is our country. Come here, and join in. You are very welcome. Do not impose your will upon us. Bring variety. Offer us more choice, but you also have a responsibility to be a part of our society.

Unfortunately we have created a belief where many people feel disenfranchised. 'They' can get this and that while we get nothing. That has created a 'them' and 'us' society - which is very unhealthy.

Participation in government by a wider cross-section sounds great, but young people don't have time to devote to the mundane of politics. They have to be self-centred, to keep the job, pay the mortgage.

Entitled to request time off work, maybe. In this county, Suffolk, 25% work for local government or public agencies. Of the remainder 90% work for firms with less than four employees. Entitled, but is it reasonable? Money can't compensate for the loss of a key worker.

52 Not another 'qualification'. More hidebound bureaucracy, more courses run by people who have no idea because they've never done the job themselves.

54. Great idea. Our PCT closed a convalescent home in Felixstowe. One that was owned by the community before the creation of the NHS. The PCT now wants to sell it to a property developer. The community wants it back. It was ours, and we have a real need for it now. We lent it to the NHS, together with sufficient funds to run the place in perpetuity. The PCT say they have lost the original deeds and the money was absorbed. It's criminal. It's theft. We feel totally powerless. We are powerless. But will this legislation prevent such crimes?

55. Our council is allowing a local developer to build expensive homes on land owned by the council. Government regulations state this should all be affordable housing. That diktat is ignored by the council. Our protests are ignored.

57. Social enterprises work, if properly supported. We put together a team to take over control of our local theatre. An extremely experienced and capable team. We were refused the chance to tender because our organisation had no financial history, so the contract was awarded to a London-based company who take our money and run, giving no more than tribute bands two nights a week. Such ridiculous situations happen all the time.

The intentions behind this White Paper are idealistically sound. In practice many will be unworkable. I'm not sure who advises the Minister but it's unlikely they live in the real world. Most of us are poor and struggling. Many are poorly educated (20% can't read and write to an acceptable standard) and we are all convinced that politicians don't really care about us. They are saving money, reacting to the latest press release, never taking the long term.

If central government really engaged with the community - and stopped believing that local councils have much to do with the local community - we could create a wonderful country in which to live that we could all enjoy.

Talk to us - stop imposing your ideas upon us. Give us tools and power and we'll build you a great nation.