Is the Council Opting-In or Selling out? The Co-operative Council - (KOV meeting update - Part 3a)

Several months ago, Jason Cobb, prior to his move, highlighted the risks of the co-operative council for the entire Borough.  Now that he's left for the wilds of deepest Essex, I'll try and keep tabs on how it will affect our hyperlocal patch, but trust me, this won't be the most exciting of posts...

I was hoping for clarification when I learned that Lambeth Council Policy manager, council officer Mike Wiltshire addressed was to address the KOV on the co-op proposition at the beginning of November.  Mr Wiltshire clearly knew his stuff, having been involved with the co-op council project since its starting point in February 2010.  After he had given a run-down of work performed so far, I'm not sure that anybody was more practically informed about what the co-op council might look like.  Question time proved a little more illuminating, but only a little...  Here follows a summary of what we heard (with my commentary added later in square brackets []):

The co-op idea was introduced due to Labour's desire to change the way services are provided and develop them more collaboratively, as well as being a way to provide quality services, despite the budget cuts from central government.  A white paper was published in May 2010 showing the Council's initial thoughts.  After that, a committee was set up chaired by Head of Lambeth Council, Steve Reed, which consists of residents, other councillors and members of national organisations. [I'd have said it's a little light on residents, but never mind...] They've received evidence from community groups, national bodies, private/public sector companies etc. to learn how the co-operative council should be delivered and are now deliberating on that evidence.  A final report, setting out the Commissioners' recommendations is due to be published in January 2011.  That report will start another 3 month consultation process.  At that point, they'll say, "when we talk about the Co-op council we mean these specific things" and see whether their recommendations are supported.  Lambeth Council will produce its response to the commission in May 2011 and will set out any recommendations it might want to accept, reject or amend.  [Any the wiser?  I wasn't.  But it seems to work quite well if you're involved in providing "consultation" services, something that's probably quite lucrative in these times...]

According to Mr Wiltshire, the commission has obtained evidence on 5 key areas, as follows...

1.  Leadership:  Two important questions have been asked: "What type of leadership should the council provide politically?" and "How can the Council be a better leader of civil society?"  The majority of people who have responded to the Commission have provided a clear message.  I quote...

"You're fine giving political leadership, but actually, you're not a particularly good community leader.  You don't listen particularly well...  If the Council are serious about this, there has to be some fundamental change to the way the organisation works... in partnership, as opposed to an organisation which attempts to consult, but doesn't do as well as it should do".  

It is thought that addressing such a matter will be a major challenge for the Council.

2.  Services:  At present, there are problems with the way services are commissioned.  Partnership is not handled well.  Commissioning and  procurement processes would need to be changed, so that the Council could be a "co-producer".  Questions arise about whether the council should be providing services themselves or whether they should be moving to different providers?  Might a social enterprise, charitable or 3rd sector organisation be more effective at delivering a service?

If an organisation shows they can deliver a service more effectively eg. youth services, under a co-op model, the council should support the organisations as opposed delivering it themselves.  To give an example, the Council has commissioned a gang intervention service named Exit.  Apparently, having a third sector organisation working intensively with children has been far more effective in drawing them away from gang involvement than traditional youth services, so the council are asking whether, if a 3rd sector group can be far more innovative, the council might commission such providers directly?  [It all sounds great, but one wonders what will happen to traditional youth clubs that are not "in vogue" at the moment, but are valuable because they're institutional and not fleeting.]

3.  Incentivisation:  People need to be encouraged to become more involved in local public service provision.  The Council want to know whether more citizens can be involved in such delivery and are trying to identify a "range of mechanisms" that would suit people.  Mr Wiltshire admitted this would be challenging because surveys so far have shown that a lot of people are already quite active in the community and the people that aren't have made the choice not to be involved for various reasons.  Consequently, it was acknowledged that trying to find a way to incentivise such people will be tricky.  [It does beg the question of whether, in the end, it might not be quicker, easier and cheaper for the Council to just run the services themselves.  But I suppose the answer to that is that there will be no money... I really dislike the idea of incentivising for voluntary work, as it seems to me akin to bribing.  Perhaps the Council would claim it's just a way of saying "thanks".]

4. Public service management:  How can the Council  manage services more effectively and enable front line officers to innovate and find new ways of delivering services?  At the moment, apparently, Lambeth Council  have "quite a controlling risk-averse culture".  The commisioners are looking at ways to try and change the culture.  They're also looking at joint-management, and asking questions such as; how can the Council more effectively join up services with the police or health providers?  Much work is already performed with Lambeth First partnership, but the Council seek to integrate services more widely.

5.  Financing:  At present, the Council try to co-ordinate budgets with other public service providers. The co-op council hope to try to centralise funding so that council, health services and  police don't just align budgets, but pool them centrally.  It seems that some of the ideas coming out of central government are broadly supportive of the notion.  [Which makes me wonder whether it's all just about cuts, cuts and more cuts].  The Commission is also looking at alternative way of funding/financing services considering a reduction in public sector funding. The Council are looking at ways of drawing in social and private sector finance to continue to fund services.  [All Council services will have to be financed somehow.  Note today a report that suggests Lambeth will consider proposals for an "opt-in" paid-for garden waste removal service and charges for bulky waste collection.  I fear a return to fly-tipping, so I'm hoping they've some kind of social finance scheme up their sleeves.  I've not a clue what "social finance" might be!]

I've split this post in two because despite editing, once I've added the question-time and some of my comments, we're looking at an essay-length write-up!  Continue reading if you want to see the questions that were asked as a result of this presentation....

Lambeth Council does something

There is a piece in the Guardian today (topped off with a lovely picture of lots of knives) that suggest Lambeth Council are launching an initiative. I realise that this, in itself, might be shocking to some people. However, having been a resident of an north London council who will not be mentioned, I will at least defend Lambeth on the matter of recycling. Apparently, since I last lived in Lambeth (2006), they've even brought in tetrapack recycling. *squee* How exciting! But since I'm nearly as much a recycling geek as I am a public transport geek, I shall save all of the posts about recycling goodness, and the possibility/likelihood of obtaining orange bags etc. until the move has taken place.

What's interesting from the three wheeled pleb's point of view is that Lambeth Council's initiative is about knife crime, which has some bearing on the SE11 area.

I have grave doubts that any council initiative can "solve" knife crime. I suspect that public money being spent in a certain manner might well go to solve the issue, but it's likely (although not guaranteed) that the money will be put to short term fixes rather than long term solutions. It seems to me obvious that the key to tackling crime is to tackle poverty. Whilst it is not clear that it is only those who live in poverty who commit crime, it seems that there is significant correlation. I was persuaded some years ago that one solution to the poverty/crime dynamic is to spend significantly on early years projects. If one engages with women on a single income at the stage when they are first pregnant, and teaches them about healthy eating / alcohol/drug consumption risk during pregnancy, then their child is significantly less likely (due to early intervention from development agencies) to engage in a life of crime. It must be stressed that such early intervention means that they and their children are given access to services and education that mean they're not left to fend for themselves. It's been quite a while sine I've looked at any of this, but Google for the "Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development" for a source about these ideas.

So... how long is the initiative?

The Guardian says:

the five-year strategy is the first "long-term comprehensive" initiative of its kind to be set up in England

It depends what they do over the five years as to how effective it is. I'm not convinced that a 5 year strategy is long enough to tackle the causes of crime. There's too much risk that fundign can be obtained for helpful services which will then fold in 5 years time.

So... where are Lambeth Council spending their money?

The Guardian says:

a series of initiatives that include increased investment in youth services run by and for local people, a specialist outreach team for hard-to-reach youngsters, parenting classes, and a network of police officers in primary schools.

I like the sound of the parenting classes, but I'd prefer it to say "ante-natal classes" since I think that the earlier the intervention, the better. I'm also a massive fan of Camilla Batmanghelidj's charity, Kids Company. It's a self-referring charity for children in South east London, and I believe they do some great work, offering mentoring, skills, and a safe place to hang about. I hope that they'll be on the receiving end of some of the cash (rather than somebody wasting money setting up new Lambeth bodies) to do the same thing. I'm a bit sceptical about the police officers in primary schools, but we'll see. I believe I also once read a BBC article on some research which suggests that teenagers who attend /unstructured/ youth clubs are more exposed to becoming involved with criminal activities. So let's hope that we have fewer youth clubs with very structured activities, rather than more youth clubs that effectively offer little more than a pool table.

Also, I figure that since most of Lambeth's initiative will have occurred too late to offer hope to those people in the 16-19 bracket, we won't have seen the end of the knife crime / stabbings for a while yet. So... The Lambeth Council initiative (if effective) will not really kick in for another 5 years (at least) especially if targeted at younger children, and things could get worse in the meantime. That means (and here I'm being rather pessimistic) that just as the initiative starts working, the public won't have seen the effects, and the whole initiative will be pulled just as it has begun to work (if it does) on the grounds that the public will claim that knife crime has risen, and that the scheme is a waste of public money.

I hope they prove me wrong.

My strategy (and personal goals):

1. Know your nearest neighbours (at least 2 households) well enough to offer them a cup of tea.
2. Know 15 people in your postcode (preferably outside if you're on a boundary) that are also on good enough terms with their nearest neighbours to be able to offer them a cup of tea.
3. Become involved in one youth initiative in your area (youth club, Guides, Scouts, parenting classes, Sunday school, mosque group, school reading scheme).

I figure that if everybody followed all three steps that we could virtually prevent all knife crime in the Borough of Lambeth... Even if we only followed the top 2 steps, we'd have created such a web of people that a great many social ills coudl be solved.

Maybe I should start a "have a cup of tea" campaign. The drawback? I don't drink tea :)