Spending cuts will break Big Society, warns nef

The scale and speed of the public spending cuts will leave civil society with an impossible job to do and not nearly enough support, according to a new report. The result of the cuts and the Government’s ‘Big Society’ initiative will be a poorer, more hard-pressed society, not a bigger one.
The report, by independent think-tank the New Economics Foundation (nef), provides the first analysis of the prospects for the Big Society in the context of the Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR). It concludes that the success of the Big Society depends on Government revising its policies on public spending cuts to guarantee sufficient and sustained support for local government, community groups and third sector organisations.
The report argues that the CSR undermines the Government’s claim that “we are all in this together”. The cuts impose a heavier burden on networks and groups in disadvantaged neighbourhoods and reduce resources available to them. The conditions that make participation in the Big Society possible, and likely, are not equally distributed across society. Those who have more to start with will benefit the most.
“What we are seeing here is the end of the post war settlement”, said Anna Coote, Head of Social Policy at nef and author of the report. “The Big Society shifts responsibility away from democratic government to self-help, mutual aid, philanthropy, local enterprise and big business. The cuts mean there is a much heavier responsibility for dealing with more acute poverty, unemployment, distress and social conflict. It is madness to imagine that in these conditions civil society can fill the gaps left by a retreating state.”
nef calls on Government to extend to the economy the central principle underpinning the Big Society – that power should be decentralised and people enabled to run their own affairs. This would give people more power to influence the way markets work and their impact on social justice.
nef proposes six key actions to make the best of the Big Society, including a clear goal of well-being for all, a gradual move towards a shorter paid working week, and more equal partnerships between providers and users of services.

♦ A very useful short paper on the Big Society has been produced by the Development Trusts Association. It outlines the key principles and initiatives of the Government's vision – such as the Big Society Bank, the Transition Fund and National Citizen Service, and notes other related policies such as the Localism Bill and Local Enterprise Partnerships. Community Enterprise and the Big Society in a climate of cuts can be seen via the attachment below.