Civil Society

Baroness Smith of Basildon Excerpts

Thursday 18th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Prosser on securing today’s debate, which is not just enjoyable and interesting but also important. It is important that we recognise and address the challenges facing civil society. I have three points to make.

The first is about the value of civil society. That is not a term invented by any Government; it has been around for a long time. We all think that we understand it, but we all interpret it differently. A key part of civil society is the voluntary and community sector, but I think it is a much broader, a much wider and a much more inclusive concept. When the current Government replaced the Office of the Third Sector with the Office of Civil Society, they relied on the more traditional definition of being synonymous with the voluntary and community sector. They announced that government policy would concentrate on three issues, all related to the voluntary and community sector. The noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Holbeach, in a parliamentary Answer, stated that the Office for Civil Society,

“will support charities, social enterprises and voluntary organisations … encouraging a big society and addressing disadvantage by making it easier to set up and run such organisations … the office will co-ordinate work across government to implement the big society and establish a number of flagship big society projects”.—[Official Report, 21/7/2010; col. 969.]

We now rarely hear about the big society, but my point is that those government definitions miss the point. It is not about structures. As important as the voluntary and community sector is, I will offer a different definition. Civil society is the glue that unites and connects society: the notion that we are not just individuals, but that by coming together and working together we can improve the lives of others, improve our own lives, improve society and contribute to our communities, however local or global those communities may be. It is not part of state institutions.

My second point concerns the role of civil society. I am coming to regret that the role is too often seen as just third-sector delivery of services. I am certainly not against contracts or third-sector commissioning. I declare an interest since I chair the board of trustees of a not-for-profit organisation, Resolving Chaos, and am involved with a number of charities and voluntary organisations that provide services. Some are commissioned, some funded and some are provided voluntarily. I am slightly disconcerted by the Government’s publication yesterday of the lobbying Bill, which, taken alongside comments made before the last election, could fetter and curtail the activities of such organisations in a way that could work against the benefits that civil society brings.

In the previous Government, I was the Cabinet Office Minister with responsibility for the charitable and third sectors. I made it clear that the Labour Government would continue to be a strong advocate for the campaigning role of civil society organisations. The role of voluntary and community sector campaigners provides a voice for some of the most disenfranchised, disengaged and vulnerable in our communities.

To assert, as Oliver Letwin did in a speech to the NCVO Conference in February 2010, that what he treasured about the sector was not its campaigning role but its “special contribution” to do something to “change things” and solve problems is to misunderstand fundamentally the inextricable link between the two. Those that complain that,

“so much … effort in some parts of the voluntary sector is devoted to campaigning”,

should recognise that such campaigning is an intrinsic part of civil society and wider democratic engagement in the system.

I will go further. I will give a hypothetical example of a charity that supports homeless people. It may have some contracts; it may have some funded services. It will raise funds and have supportive donors. If there is an area of council or government policy that in its professional opinion, at the sharp end of service delivery and support, is exacerbating the problem, surely it has a duty to its supporters, to its donors and to civil society to campaign to try to address that issue. It cannot turn away from its campaigning role and its responsibilities in that regard. It has an obligation to the homeless whom it is seeking to help.

It was Dom Helder Camara, a Brazilian Archbishop, who said:

“When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist”.

We need to take care that we do not slide into the position that we accept civil society as long as it knows its place, which is to provide direct help and support, but not to tackle or help tackle the causes of the problems and to campaign to address the causes of those problems. That would be plain wrong.

The lobbying Bill refers specifically to third-party organisations’ campaigns at election time. It does not specify which election, so I assume that it refers to all elections. There are issues to be discussed, but we need to ensure that we do not curtail legitimate campaigning activity or provide an opportunity for government or local authorities to issue bad news and unpopular policies just before elections, thus preventing third-party organisations campaigning against those policies.

My third and final point concerns financial issues. We have heard a considerable amount about the impact that cuts are having on organisations that support the community. I have genuine concerns that the future of civil society is being undermined by funding problems. The previous Labour Government had a number of programmes, including one I particularly liked—the Grassroots Grants programme—that directly supported more than 130,000 local groups to make a real difference in the heart of communities.

A report from the NCVO and research by Compact Voice show that the voluntary sector at the heart of civil society is facing an unprecedented level of cuts and further threats to income. Funding is not the only way of supporting civil society, but we need to take care that funding, whether through contracts, subsidies or grants, provides value for money in both financial and social terms, and the impact on civil society must be taken into account. My community is in Essex—as is that of my noble friend Lady Gibson. When Basildon borough council announced a cut in the subsidy to local community centres for pensioners’ hot meals, local residents were shocked and appalled. They understand the social benefit to civil society of the centres. Perhaps what made that cut particularly shocking was the fact that the responsible council cabinet member declared that the meals were not good value for money while her cabinet colleague defended spending £150,000 on consultants to measure grass—that is bizarre but it is true—as being good value for money, so measuring grass was more important than providing hot meals. I am convinced that the public see that as nonsense and understand that value for money is not just a purely economic judgment. They make those same judgments in their own personal spending. They understand value judgments, not just economics. It is about common sense, communities and the value that institutions of government at whatever level place on society.

Too often, it seems that local authorities find it easiest to impose cuts on the voluntary sector. I strongly believe in the power of volunteering for the volunteer and those being supported. As we heard from my noble friend Lady Prosser, some volunteering grows organically but needs structure and support to obtain the best value from it. Like many others, my local volunteer centre in Basildon has now closed. Due to funding cuts, it could no longer sustain its work. I have sincere worries about the impact that will have on civil society.

In conclusion, engagement in civil society adds value and improves quality of life. It is not something we can just pay lip service to here today and say how wonderful it is, then go away and do nothing. It is intrinsic and essential and it needs and deserves our support.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

If it helps the noble Lord, I will explain the point I was making. The Lobbying Bill suggests that third-party organisations would not be allowed to be involved in campaigning during a general election. I wanted to ensure there would not be the unintended consequence of stopping them campaigning at all during elections when there might be legitimate reasons for them to do so.

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I can allay her concerns on this. I was very struck when I was briefed this morning on this by the sheer scale of the funds some organisations have used and targeted. It is that sort of development we are thinking about. I hope I have covered most, if not all, of the points made in the debate.