New Year wishes

The first day week is always a good time to think about what you hope to see in the coming year. Here are four wishes for the coming weeks and months.


1. That more rural communities start to believe in what they can achieve together
Our biggest single barrier remains of communities not seeing that they can be the solution to the problems they face. Whether inspired by the Big Society vision or driven by the age of austerity, there are real opportunities for more communities to take control this year.


2. That more communities who have saved their village shop will now go further
A number of communities are now on to their second generation of their shop. Inspired by their own achievement, they are taking co-operation as stage further by tackling the other issues their communities face to create multi-purpose enterprises that go far beyond the original shop. Let's see more taking that next step.


3. That even more diverse forms of rural social enterprise will emerge
We've see the shop success spawn the co-operative use of pubs, churches and many other enterprises. Let's see the imagination run riot on solving issues not tackled before.


4. That the Coalition Government recognises that communities shouldn't have to reinvent wheels
The passion for encouraging frontline action is laudable, but those on the frontline want to devote their energy to their community, not in solving problems that others have solved before. Recognising the role of specialist intermediary bodies to spread knowledge is a vital part of helping of making the Big Society a reality on the frontline.

Localism & Mutualisation: time to learn from the 19th century

The Coalition Government has the opportunity to learn from a 19th century co-operative mistake or to limit the opportunity that its Big Society presents. At present we have a Government committed to the mutualisation of public service and localism bringing more community control, with the two being developed separately.

In the late 19th century, the rapidly expanding Co-operative Movement went to war with itself over the role of worker co-operation. One side wanted to see the new factories as worker owned, the other saw consumer co-operation as the only true way forward. Sadly, both lost out in the conflict, leaving a movement divided and less diverse than many of its international counterparts. It is only in recent years that serious attempts have been made to find common ground between the two camps.

What the Government needs to learn quickly is that these are not two separate initiatives, just as the very early co-ops drew no distinction. Mutualisation will only succeed if there is genuine engagement with local communities including them having ownership where relevant. Localism needs to include enterprise and worker co-operation has a vital role to play here. The Big Society needs to see this connection or pay the price that the Co-operative Movement has done for its 19th century error.

A mutual solution for the Post Office?

Fear of crime in rural areas is high, yet actual crime is lower than most urban areas. By the same token, fear of losing the local Post Office is high even though the network closure programme is long over and Post Office Ltd has been working hard to build a modern network that can meet rural needs. Even so, the fear remains.

The Government's announcement on the future of the Post Office last week will have triggered that fear again. Yet its plans offer a real opportunity for rural communities. It has stated that the Post Office will either remain under state control or become a mutual. Plunkett's position on mutualisation is to judge each by how genuinely mutual it will be and to challenge if it isn't. In the case of the Post Office, it looks good so far. We see clear criteria to ensure a balance of interests and a real opportunity for community-owned shops to have a voice at the highest level.

We'll be urging all communities that want to protect their postal services to engage in the consultation to ensure that the final outcome is as mutual as the draft bill intends. Genuine ownership of the postal services, so vital to village life, could turn that fear into pride.

An end to an irrational fear of irrationality?

It was great to spend time on Saturday evening with Tom Webb from the Masters of Co-operative Management at St Mary's University in Canada. Tom has been one of my great inspirations for over a decade now. His work on Marketing Our Co-operative Advantage (MOCA) led to the creation of much of the work at Oxford, Swindon & Gloucester Co-op. Tom went on to create the Masters programme at St Mary's and its sister programme the Center for Excellence in Accounting and Reporting for Co-operatives. In all this work, Tom has been relentless in asking the question "I know how this works in mainstream enterprises, but how does it work at a co-op?". He has applied this to every area, from marketing to accounting.

To me, our conversation had the feel of light at the end of the tunnel. We have both spent our lives trying to convince managers that acting as a co-operative is the only rational approach to running a co-operative. This is approach has often been dismissed by managers who sought to slavishly follow big business ethics. Our way was seen as somehow wooly and less rigourous. Tom saw the credibility of a co-operative approach as being vindicated with co-operative economics now being given three nobel prizes in recent years. I saw the supposed irrationality of our approach being vindicated through our rapidly growing understanding of behavioural economics, in which so many of the levers of change were strengthened through co-operative action.

So we spent a pleasant evening, together with the Program's Director, Larry Haiven, exploring the bridge that was being built between the two. Ten years on and still inspiring me.

Time to reflect

The distinct lack of posts from me over the last few months has been a reflection of the hectic life at Plunkett post-election. A few weeks back, I was given a chance to reflect on this at the excellent Futures North conference in Leeds. I explored what our experiences of engaging with the Coalition Government on the Big Society had been like so far.

It probably surprised a few that I had some positive things to say. In particular, I highlighted its willingness to address the barriers that stand in the way of communities developing co-operative enterprises. This barrier removal agenda was across Government and at all levels. It should be commended and supported.

But I also highlighted the current design fault in Big Society thinking, namely its inability to recognise that communities do not, and should not have to, reinvent wheels every time they want to solve a problem. This sharing of ideas and best practice has always been a vital part of community development, yet the Government was still struggling to appreciate the role that infrastructure organisations play in helping communities to solve problems faster and more effectively.

The Co-operative Movement has known this since its early days. I cited Mondragon, Quebec and Davis as examples of how that willingness to support had marked the upward surge of the Movement. But it also gave a challenge to co-operators, for it required us to act rather than waiting for others. The Co-operative Enterprise Hub is a great example of a co-operative doing just that. I also cited our own reaction to the Government's cancellation of the Community Pub Support Programme. Our approach had been to bring together other co-operators who would have supported the original scheme and to agree together that we would support every one of the 82 communities that the Government had turned its back on.

This co-operative approach to life would not only make the Big Society real, it might also help to build the Co-operative Movement we dreamt of.

Community retailing North and South of the border

It was a huge pleasure last week to go up to Scotland for the AGM of the Community Retailing Network. CRN has been doing great work in Scotland to support community-owned since 2004. We've been discussing some time about how CRN and Plunkett could work closer together and last week was an important step forward. I joined its board together with our trustee John Don and we hope that our members will put a CRN Board member onto the Plunkett Board at our AGM.

There is tremendous potential benefit for both countries. Although both have community-owned shops, they are two quite different traditions. Scottish shops tend to be larger and further away from the competition, with the logistics of this often solved by a close working relationship with the Co-operative Group. English stores are more numerous and will often face strong local competition. This has often resulted in some leading edge retailing and marketing to create a real co-operative difference.

Each can learn from the other and it is going to be fun having time to explore this together.

Up for the Climate Challenge

It was an exciting day last week when the Making Local Food Work conference in Manchester saw the launch of the new report "Local Food and Climate Change".

Everyone involved in local food has had to put up with years of being told that research showed that our contribution to tackling climate change wasn't all that it was cracked up to be. Some even claiming that multiple retailers were better placed.

The report throws down a challenge to the sector that we can make a huge difference, but only if we focus on what needs to be done.

But the challenge to policy formers is even greater. They need to recognise the community action is one of the building blocks for tackling climate change. They need to see that we are better placed to bring people together by changing their views one community at a time.

And, at long last, the local food movement can hold its head up high on what it can do through the amazing range of people, projects, enterprises and communities that are part of it.