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Tim Draimin

Social Innovation Europe Initiative Launched in Brussels :: wbc-inco.net - 0 views

  • On March 16 and 17, 2011, Social Innovation Europe was launched in Brussels. Funded by the European Commission, Social Innovation Europe will create a dynamic, entrepreneurial and innovative new Europe. The time has come for Europe to embrace the broad concept of innovation and set an example globally. By 2014, Social Innovation Europe will have become the meeting place - virtual and real - for social innovators, entrepreneurs, non-profit organisations, policy makers and anyone else who is inspired by social innovation in Europe. Through a series of gatherings, and a new online resource, Social Innovation Europe will: connect projects and people who can share experiences and learn from each other; develop an easily accessible resource bank - so you can find about other projects, organisations and ways of working; develop a resource bank of up to date policies at local and national levels and provide information on funding opportunities; facilitate new relationships between civil society, governments, public sector institutions and relevant private sector bodies develop concrete recommendations in financing and in upscaling/mainstreaming of social innovation in Europe Download the conference report.
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    Social Innovation goes mainstream in Europe as European Union launches SI Europe March 2011 conference with presentations by Geoff Mulgan, Vickie Cammack of Tyze, many others including José Manuel Durão Barroso, President of the European Commission. His speech included: SPEECH/11/190 José Manuel Durão Barroso President of the European Commission Europe leading social innovation Social Innovation Europe initiative Brussels, 17 March 2011 Ladies and Gentlemen, It is a pleasure to be here and see all of you around this very important issue - how to pursue our dialogue on social innovation. I would like to thank Geoff Mulgan and Diogo Vasconcelos for their kind invitation and also to congratulate them together with Louise Pulford for having won the call to set up the pilot initiative "Social innovation Europe". I also would like to thank DG enterprise for having organised this launch event today. As you know the Commission is fully involved. Lázsló Andor was with you yesterday. Máire Geoghegan-Quinn will be with you today, so this idea of innovation is indeed a major issue for the Commission I am proud to lead. Europe has a long and strong tradition of social innovation: from the workplace to hospices, and from the cooperative movement to microfinance. We have always been a continent of creative social entrepreneurs who have designed systems to enhance education, health, social inclusion and the well-being of citizens. By nature social innovation is an ever-evolving field to keep pace with fast-changing challenges in society. But what concretely do we mean by social innovation? I think it is important to recognise that this concept is not yet fully accepted in the political debate. I think social innovation is about meeting the unmet social needs and improving social outcomes. It is about tapping into the creativity of charities, associations and social entrepreneurs to find new ways of meeting pressing social needs, which are not adequately met
Tim Draimin

White paper on Opening up Public Services - Evolution not revolution | 2020 PSH - 0 views

  • White paper on Opening up Public Services – Evolution not revolution
  • After months of waiting, the White Paper on Opening up Public Services has finally been published. In its advance billing it had been variously referred to as the Big Society strategy, the next leap forward on public services, and the missing narrative on public service reform.  Clearly the Big Society radicals lost the argument about what this should be about, because revolutionary it is not.  This is less about chaos and more about cohesion.
  • There is a noticeable switch in tone in this White Paper from earlier Coalition policy announcements. Out has gone the hyperbole to be replaced with a more considered, and reasonable argument. So evolutionary is this that it explicitly builds on New Labour policy developments, such as academies, foundation trusts and individual budgets. Even the narrative now has distinct echoes of New Labour circa 2005, with the emphasis on modernisation, choice, commissioning reform and competition. Its primary purpose is to establish a policy framework, based on a set of guiding principles, within which public service reform will develop. Much of the focus is therefore on seeking to retrofit existing policy and reforms into these principles.
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  • Some specific observations:  No such thing as the Big Society? – considering that at one stage this was supposed to give policy substance to the Big Society, it is striking how absent the Big Society is from the White Paper. That’s one cut it didn’t make.  I did a control search and only came across one Big Society reference in the whole report, and this was not to the idea but to the Big Society bank. So this leaves an obvious question about how central the Big Society now will be to the Government? One practical effect of there being no Big Society strand is that the tenor of the White Paper is much more consumerist, gone appears to be the emphasis on social citizenship and responsibility.  This leaves a big gap because, as our Commission on 2020 Public Services argued, the big challenges of the future will need to be met through citizens and the state working together to create better social outcomes.  Very few concrete proposals – This is about direction of travel, rather than specific proposals. In fact, there are very few concrete proposals. Instead this is much more like a Green Paper in which general propositions are put out for consultation, with the question being what specific policy changes would these require? This is clearly a long way from what some of the Big Society evangelists had originally wanted to see.  No short term wins for the voluntary sector – Earlier in the year there had been speculation that the White Paper might contain some specific guarantees for the voluntary sector to help offset the consequences of Council grant cuts.  But, whilst there are warm words for the role of the voluntary sector, and some new development money and support to help develop social social enterprises, there is no specific commitment to, for example, a quota of Council services to be subject to voluntary sector right to bid.   Diversity of provision – the boldest statement in the White Paper is that there is no case for monopoly state provision of services, except for the special cases of defence, criminal justice and policing.  The case is made for all public services to be run on the basis of autonomous institutions such as Academies and Foundation Trusts, which could be run by businesses, mutuals or social enterprises.  However, there are no specific proposals to apply this to any particular service area.  Local government is the big winner – this is the most pro-local government policy paper to have been published by the Coalition.  Whereas, the distinct impression in previous policy developments on public service reform has been that local government was being sidestepped, now it is much more central to the Coalition’s plans for decentralisation.  The principle of decentralisation which is set out in the white paper bears some similarity with the subsidiarity principle developed in the 1990s by the European Union, under which decisions should be devolved to the lowest possible level of government.  The new twist to this is the emphasis in the white paper on establishing neighbourhood councils in urban areas to mirror parishes and to be responsible for the same types of very local, community and public space services.  But the White Paper also makes the case for more powers and greater financial autonomy for local authorities and, in one of its few specific proposals, also recommends that skills funding should pass to some Councils, something which cities like Manchester have been strongly pushing for.
  • As Nick Timmins noted in the FT today, there are a number of tensions within the White Paper, which are not even acknowledged, let alone resolved.  He cited the principle of promoting diversity whilst at the same time needing to guard against failure, a weakness of successive health reforms and a particularly current concern given the collapse of Southern Cross.   But this isn’t the half of it. Other questions which the White Paper doesn’t confront, but which a credible reform plan would have to resolve, include:  Service integration vs institutional autonomy – how can local government integrate services in the way that the white paper suggests, whilst at the same time vertical service silos are being strengthened through the promotion of institutional autonomy in schools, hospitals, and now in every other service?  Consumerism vs social citizenship – how can a consumerist approach to public services help strengthen the co-productive relationship which there will need to be between citizens and services to meet the social challenges of 2020 and beyond?  Ideas vs practice – how can the Coalition move from exhortation to implementation? The White Paper may contain a framework of principles but it does not set out a convincing strategy as to how reforms based on these could be implemented.  Over the coming weeks we at 2020 will be analysing the Coalition’s reform agenda in more detail and looking to see where the opportunities exist for developing better social productivity practice.  Please let us have your comments and ideas.  Ben Lucas
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    New proposals on mutualizing public services in the UK
Adam Jagelewski

Ottawa's United Way changes funding process - 0 views

  • United Way Ottawa took a big step toward a major cultural shift in the social sector Wednesday with the announcement of $6 million in funding to local agencies based on an open competition for dollars.In the past the United Way had member agencies, which could usually count on program funding year to year.
  • In the coming year, there will be support for 115 programs at 70 agencies, with 24 of the programs new to the United Way. That leaves about 55 other programs at more than 37 agencies facing funding cuts, although the United Way said every agency received some reduced funding to ease the transition to zero. The transition funding ranges from $1,700 for Autism Ontario's Ottawa Chapter to $46,000 for Citizen Advocacy of Ottawa, which has received United Way support for decades. Other agencies losing program funding include the City for All Women Initiative, Co-operative des ainés francophones (CAFEO), Planned Parenthood Ottawa and Leadership Ottawa.
  • "Donors want to know, what difference is their investment making?" said Michael Allen, president of United Way Ottawa.
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  • "We received 225 proposals for $18 million in funding, and we had $6 million to hand out this time," said Jeffrey Dale, chair of United Way Ottawa's investment committee. "We knew we had to make hard choices
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