Are we in danger of losing the language of Co-operation?
To bring about the transformation of ‘Social Services’ policy and legislation, the language we use, and the definition of concepts to empower require particular attention.

We observed in conversations and responses to the recent draft Social Services (Wales) Bill 2012 consultation, a lack of familiarity with the meaning of different service models.

A variety of models offer to achieve the reform of the social care system and are claimed to achieve ‘co-production’. However, their governance arrangements require particular scrutiny if are to deliver the improved quality services.
We must therefore be wary of using terms such as ‘co-operatives’, ‘mutuals’ and  ‘social enterprises’. They are not interchangeable concepts as we explained in our response to the above consultation. Without precise definition words can easily become all things to all people and just another slogan.

Historically, co-operatives have at least three roots – consumer, producer and worker co-operatives. Now, we can add Credit Unions and significantly the multi stakeholder co-operative model. There may be others?

The consumer model is a familiar presence on the High Street in retail societies, The Co-operative Group being a national example with an annual turnover of £14bn. The key point is members own this consumer organisation, and join for £1, with member and community benefits and opportunity for democratic engagment.

Mondragon is a Spanish example of a worker co-operative owned and controlled by its  “workers manual administrative and technical of both sexes’” who have invested in their own business to make it work. Robert Oakeshott is excellent at explaining ‘The Case for Workers’ Co-ops’ (1990).

Producer co-ops are a separate model reflecting the vital role of co-ops in agriculture. Producers, although they may own their co-op, are not formally employed by it. Their relationship to their co-op is very different operationally, from the relationship of workers-owners to their worker co-op, as in Big Pit.

A further distinction recognises the other key co-op structure as applied to financial services are credit unions.

Although often cited, the John Lewis Partnership is not a worker co-operative. It’s workers are just that, partners in the business.

With Welsh Government focusing upon ‘citizen centred service’ delivery, and early intervention, the multi stakeholder model is better placed to sustainably meet the needs of service users thorough engaging the service user, worker and wider community interests in service planning and delivery.

The success of the Quebec model was revealed in research commissioned by the Wales Progressive Co-operators for the Assembly Health and Social Care committee’s current Residential inquiry. Significantly, it provided further evidence that there are other choices to the private and public sector mix, but it requires people who wish to contribute to their own health and wellbeing.

This model has the greatest possibilities for transforming the relationship between the service user – as an owner and member and the organisation providing care. But it is not the only model. Nor is it suggested that frail older people must be active members. Clearly, informal carers, community and co-operative movement supporters can help ensure effective governance.

In our view, this provides in a substantive form, what we think ‘co-production’ actually means, with local co-operative businesses owned and run by and for their members.

There are distinct differences between mutuals, co-operatives and social enterprises. Direct accountability isn’t an essential characteristic of social enterprises, compared with the formal accountability of co-operatives. In Wales, some small successful, relevant care models are being swallowed up by venture capitalists – an eventuality that co-operatives have learnt to protect themselves from through their constitution.
The Westminster government misuses the term mutual with the loosest of interpretations. Their Health Department has announced the investment of £19m over the next year for social enterprise to support frontline staff to run services that provide what they think their local population really need. http://www.networks.nhs.uk/networks/news/social-enterprises-to-receive-ps19-million-investment-over-next-year-announced  Is this privatisation being dressed up as ‘mutualism’?
The power of the multi stakeholder model is that it also serves the purpose of strengthening social work with social workers playing a role alongside people. People have their own answers to their problems. It is about how and what people working together wish to achieve – not thrusting things on people.

Social care people talk the same language as co-operators, with empowered service users and valued frontline staff. Good small-scale models of co-operative social care exist. Can they be scaled up in Wales?  727 words

David  and Hilda Smith
Wales Progressive Co-operators

Details of a Canadian social care expert visit to Wales 26-29th June can be found at    http://progressive-cooperators.org.uk/wales-group

Remember 2010? David Cameron became PM, the Chilean miners were rescued and the world’s aircraft came to a halt thanks to an Icelandic volcano – all landmark events. 2010 was also the year that, for the first time ever, there were more people over the age of 65 than under 16. And this trend is going to continue – by 2035 a quarter of the Welsh population will be 65 plus.

This shift in demographics brings enormous challenges.  Already too many older people live in poverty and isolation, fobbed off with uncaring services. This is not, of course, news – study after study has demonstrated the shocking way our society treats its elders.

The report we prepared for Age Alliance Wales, launched yesterday, does much more than that, however. Of course it highlights the current plight of many older people, but it does so as a baseline for monitoring action rather than for its own sake. It doesn’t paint a positive picture, without doubt.

But much more important is the action demanded by Age Alliance Wales, especially for prevention and early intervention. There’s a mountain of evidence that acting early and quickly delays or reduces the need for higher-intensity care, reduces the likelihood of illness and maintains people’s independence. And it saves money too – the rate of return is fantastic!

So why aren’t Wales’s public bodies doing this?

At the conference, the Stroke Association pointed out the devastating impact of stroke, as well as the cost to the NHS and local authorities. Regular monitoring of blood pressure to detect hypertension (a major cause) or action in the event of a TIA (an indicator of increased risk of stroke) could cut the number of strokes dramatically. Neither of these is difficult or costly – no high tech drugs, no fancy equipment.  Yet neither are common practice in Wales.

There are many more examples, from social care to adult learning all with the same message – that little bit of help, early, makes a difference.

Anyone reading this who is over 32 years of age will be in that older age group by 2035. It’s in everyone’s interest that we get services right for over 65s, now and in the future.

Victoria Winckler is Director of the Bevan Foundation

The publication this Thursday of the official Households Below Average Income statistics is the most important for half a dozen years. It is likely to spark a debate about the future of child poverty and the government’s responsibility for it.

These new statistics will apply to the financial year 2010-11. As the Coalition government took office just a few weeks into this year, the statistics largely reflect the effect of the former government’s policies. The picture these figures paint is, in effect, Labour’s legacy.

What should we be looking for when the Department for Work and Pensions publishes these statistics on Thursday morning?

The debate that might be sparked by these numbers will likely concentrate on two things: whether the 2020 targets for child poverty are sensible; and whether the child poverty measures are the right ones.

The 2020 targets are certainly tough. The single most important of them is that the relative child poverty rate should fall to 10%. To get there, the rate needs to fall by about 1% a year. Since this is what was achieved between the late 1990s and the 2004/5, progress at such a rate is possible.

10% is also only a fraction lower than the rate that was consistently recorded in the 1960s and 1970s. Compared with Tony Blair’s original idea of abolishing child poverty by 2020 – something that was outside of all experience – the Child Poverty Act introduced a dose of realism. It is hard to see how anything in Thursday’s numbers could give grounds for abandoning what was agreed so recently with all-party support.

Even if the aspiration to do something about child poverty is retained, some may use Thursday to argue that the measure of it should be changed – and formal targets abandoned.

So how good are these poverty measures based on low income? Of course they are not perfect. Given the overwhelming importance of money in modern society, neither are they ill-conceived, obviously wrong or even misleading. Not to have enough money – and the poverty line falls well below the independent Minimum Income Standard – leaves a household with no other resources severely deprived.

While well-resourced academic studies can afford to take a more sophisticated view of poverty, ‘technical’ criticisms here serve as a smokescreen for doing away with the idea that government should be held to account for what is happening on poverty. If that accountability is important, Thursday’s official statistics, handled sensibly, are the best thing we have.

Peter Kenway is Director of the New Policy Institute

Tom MacInnes is Research director at the New Policy Institute

The Energy Bill announced in the Queen’s Speech is sure to ignite intense debate about nuclear power, costs to consumers and the prospects for renewable energy development.

But another agenda that’s been simmering away for 20 years is now coming to a head – how can massive investment in energy infrastructure be delivered in ways that benefit the communities affected?

The community dimension has been the ‘Achilles Heel’ of British renewable energy policy. While the roll-out of wind power in Denmark and Germany benefited from the widespread participation of local cooperatives and farmers, British projects are typically large, commercial, mostly benefit distant shareholders and encounter local disquiet. It seems unlikely that the Energy Bill will change that.

For this reason, the spotlight needs to shine on ways of channelling some benefits from renewable energy to affected communities, and that is what our Viewpoint for JRF – Wind energy and justice for disadvantaged communities – tries to do.

We focus on how wind farm developers have conventionally delivered benefits to local people, through the provision of community benefit funds. But our research poses three main questions:

• Why should community benefits be paid? Such benefit funds have usually been viewed by policy-makers as a way of fostering acceptance of a scheme. This rarely works. A sounder reason for community benefits, we argue, is to deliver social justice – redressing the harms caused to those communities. The justice dimension is especially important given that much wind-farm development has taken place in rural or coastal areas suffering from economic, social and environmental disadvantage.
• To what extent can the level of community benefit payments be increased? Back in the 1990s, typical community benefit payments were £1,000 per megawatt, paid annually, but the best-performing companies are now delivering much more. Our research shows that local authorities have been able to raise contributions by establishing policies that request particular levels of community benefits. In Wales, for example, the Forestry Commission has been able to extract community benefits to the tune of £1.8 million each year at the recently approved Pen-y-Cymoedd wind farm.
• How might community benefits be best invested? There is a case for helping communities invest the community benefit funds in ways that improve the area’s long-term resilience. One neat example is the Stirlingshire village of Fintry, which took its community benefits in the form of ownership of a turbine in a local commercial scheme, and has ploughed back its revenue into sustainable energy measures for local housing.

We would not pretend that community benefit funds can resolve all the conflicts of a transition towards a sustainable energy system, but we do need a vigorous debate about what constitutes a fair relationship between such major projects and the communities that live with them. Improving the level and application of community benefit funds is a pragmatic and vital focus for immediate action.

What a strange document the Welsh Government’s Annual Report is.  An excellent idea, something extraordinary seems to have gone wrong in its delivery.  Most telling is that the annual report doesn’t really tell us how well (or otherwise) the Government is doing at all.

Some of the indicators the report uses don’t yet have statistics available, so no progress can be measured. Other indicators have only a year’s worth of data, which similarly tell us nothing about progress, whilst almost all indicators use data that pre-date the Government’s current term.  They tell us more about how the Labour-Plaid coalition did than how the current Government is doing.  There is very little indeed in the report which relates to the Welsh Government’s performance since May 2011.

So maybe 2013’s report will tell us a bit more?

Or maybe it won’t, because some of the indicators chosen have only a nodding acquaintance with what the Government is trying to achieve.  Take the chapter on poverty for example. It starts, quite reasonably, with measures of the proportion of people living on incomes below the poverty threshold and then looks at the proportion of children in severe poverty and the persistence of poverty. So far, so good.

The chapter goes on to look at worklessness and educational attainment.  Now, lack of a job and low educational attainment are certainly associated with poverty, but I’m not persuaded that they are useful measures of the government achievements on the subject.  And the sense of déjà vu is real, as the indicators have already been used in the education chapter, begging the question of who is responsible and accountable for, for example, the number of young people who are NEET?  Is it the Education Minister? Or perhaps the Social Justice Minister as well?  But on the grounds that worklessness and low educational attainment are strongly associated with poverty, it’ll do.

Things really go haywire when the Chapter looks at various other statistics which appear to have no relationship with poverty at all, such as child health at the age of 3, the percentage of children which are immunised against MMR, and number of free swims by children and people over 65.  Improvement on any of these measures may well be a good thing, but they have little if anything to do with tackling poverty.

And while some of the indicators in the various chapters are direct measures of government action, such as the number of participants on various programmes, many more are indicators of the general state of Wales, over which the government has relatively little control. Quite why a government would want to be held to account for the number of rail journeys, for example, when it doesn’t control the rail network, train operators, stations or ticket prices, the bulk of investment or the thousands of individual decisions about when and how to travel is a mystery.

So, as a progress report, the Welsh Government’s 2012 Annual Report is a strange beast. It tells us very little about how well the current government is doing, although it tells us something about how well the previous one did, how well the UK government did and a lot else besides.  If I got a school report like this, I’d be ringing the headteacher wondering why she was telling me about Dai when I want to know about Daisy. If I got a company report like this, I’d be wondering about whether they were on top of their game (and hanging on to my investments like crazy!).

The verdict on the report has to be: could do better.  And on the government? Who can tell.

Victoria Winckler is Director of the Bevan Foundation. To find out more about our work and to support more blog posts like this please visit www.bevanfoundation.org

There is both good and bad for poverty in current welfare reforms but unfortunately, on balance, our forecasts show the bad risks outweighing the good. By 2020, we expect to see over one in four children and four in ten lone parents living below the relative income poverty line. Predictions for absolute poverty are not much better, with an expected rise to 23% for children.

These increases are in spite of positive impacts expected for Universal Credit by itself. In general, there is a lot to be welcomed about Universal Credit, as it should simplify the benefit system and remove some of the uncertainty about going into work for claimants. However, the decision to localise Council Tax Benefit and the Social Fund go against the grain of having a single and easy-to-understand process. Another problem is that it only ameliorates and doesn’t tackle the very high marginal tax rates for people trying to earn more in work.

The UK labour market remains the elephant in the room for welfare reform. It is important to “make work pay” through setting benefits in relation to earnings but we need to look at the sorts of jobs people are going into. Too often these are short-term, poorly paid, low-skilled and dead-end. Our research shows that the continued hollowing out of better quality jobs in the middle is one of the drivers of rising inequality. And with 6 million people underemployed in the economy, more and better jobs must be the priority.

Julia Unwin is Chief Executive of Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Joseph Rowntree Housing Trust

This blog was first published on the Joseph Rowntree Blog

In Wales, we face a serious problem of inequalities in attainment between the rich and poor.  At most stages in education, there is a significant gap in attainment between those who receive free school meals (FSM) and those who do not.  Whilst FSM might not be the best measure, it is the most reliable indicator we have.  The underachievement of poorer pupils means they are less likely to enter university, secure employment, and realise their aspirations.  In short, the family they are born into still pretty much determines the chances young people living in Wales, and other parts of the UK, will have in life.

So what can we do, and are the Welsh Government proposing to do, to alleviate this problem?  The Welsh Government’s most recent policy announcement aimed at tackling the issue is their ‘Pupil Deprivation Grant’.  In the same way as the UK Government introduced the ‘Pupil Premium’, this grant gives extra money to schools based upon the number of their pupils in receipt of FSM.  This policy is a financial approach to solving the problem – the theory goes that if you give schools extra money, they will be able to do more to help poorer pupils.  School’s have the flexibility on how to spend the extra money, but the Government is encouraging them to think about literacy and numeracy in particular, as well as how the progress of particular students might be tracked, and how voluntary statutory and other community services, and parents, might have an impact.

But, to what extent might this approach reduce the attainment gap? Research shows that increased resources doesn’t necessarily equate to better outcomes for poorer pupils.  Indeed, since the Labour Government massively increased education spending, the gap in achievement between rich and poor hasn’t seen a substantial change.  We know that the home environment of young people is more important than schooling, which is the main factor behind the gap in achievement between rich and poor.  However this is not to say that schools can’t make a difference, and clearly an increase in resources is a good thing, but given the importance of background, we can only expect this difference to be marginal.  It is their different experiences at home which matter most.  We know that the home experiences of middle class children are more attune to what will be expected of them in school.  The kind of cultural activities and experiences they have at home as well as their vocabulary development all better prepare them for succeeding at school.

Therefore, in spending their extra cash, school leaders might want to consider the differences between home and school for those from disadvantaged backgrounds.  Practical solutions need to take into account the fact that the school, and it’s particular ways of doing things, approaches, language use, may be unfamiliar territory for many poorer pupils.  One possible solution to address this might include the development of mentors who work on a 1 to 1 basis with disadvantaged young people specifically helping them to cope, and succeed, at school.  The mentors could help young people cope with challenges such as how best to address conflict with their peers or teachers.

Addressing the gap in attainment remains a massive and ongoing challenge for Wales.  What is clear though is that we need to know what works.  With schools being given the opportunity to decide for themselves what to do with the extra resources, it means we have an excellent opportunity to measure which specific practices might make the most difference.

Michael Donnelly is Policy and Research Officer at the Bevan Foundation

Scarcely a week goes by without a new report demonstrating the plight of people on low incomes in Wales.  This steady stream of reports is being generated not just because third sector organisations in Wales are effective campaigners – which they are – but because of the plight of hundreds of thousands of people.

Today, there are about 650,000 people in Wales who are living on an income that is so low that they are deemed to be “in poverty”,  about one in four of the Welsh population overall.   Although much of the focus is on child poverty,  no group of people has the monopoly on poverty – there are more than 100,000 people in poverty in each children, their parents, working age adults without children or pensioners.

The outlook for poverty in Wales is grim.  People face a toxic combination of welfare reform, a weak labour market and rising prices, which are not only putting individuals and families under real pressure but also changing the shape of poverty in Wales.  There is every likelihood that there will be a significant increase in the numbers of people in Wales with incomes below the poverty threshold – IFS estimate 22,000 more children and adults of working age will be in poverty by 2014/15.

But the headline poverty ‘rate’ does not tell the whole story.   It is inevitable that the changes in social security will increase the number of people in crisis, in which they have no income at all. The re-assessment of eligibility and tough sanctions for non-compliance with benefit requirements are bound to mean that some people simply lose their benefits, as well as the ever-present risk of a DWP error during all the changes. As a stark reminder of this, food banks are facing unprecedented demand and more are being set up across Wales every week.

We can also reasonably expect that the number of people in severe poverty – defined as 50% of median income – will increase.  If the poorest 10 per cent are to lose 10 per cent of their income, it cannot do otherwise.  With this, we will see more people who simply do not have enough money to eat well, heat their homes or afford basics such as a warm coat or shoes.

On top of this, we are likely to see a very substantial increase in people living in hardship. This isn’t a technical term, but it usefully describes people who may or may not be living in poverty according to the statistical definition but whose wellbeing is severely affected by rising prices coupled with static or declining wages and shrinking ‘top-up’ benefits such as Working Tax Credit and Child Benefit.

But it’s not just about money – there are likely to be significant social costs ahead as people reliant on social security benefits are forced to change how they live to fit in with new benefit rules. This isn’t about people making a “lifestyle choice” – it’s about all choice being removed from anyone on a low income.

The scale of the challenge is, then, enormous: the number of people in poverty today is a disgrace. But the change ahead is a game changer. The old ways of working are not going to be enough.  The Welsh Government, other public sector bodies, third sector and private sector too all need to re-think their existing approaches to tackling poverty. More of the same is simply not good enough.

Victoria Winckler is Director of the Bevan Foundation. This is an edited version of a speech given to the WCVA / Bevan Foundation conference “Hard Times Ahead” on 30th May 2012. A fuller version will appear in the next issue of the Bevan Foundation’s magazine, Review, later this month.

Meeting on a sunny May afternoon, members from the Co-operative movement, Local Government, the Welsh Government, and a range of Third Sector and citizen organisations pooled their considerable expertise in the service of a better future for older and disabled people.

Wales is currently in the throes of a range of crucial changes to the laws and structures of social services.  A Social Services (Wales) Bill is due out, and also consultations on the creation of a Welsh model of Self Directed Support and a Strategy for social care Social Enterprise.

These changes are being shaped with an increasing openness to the role and added value of co-operative principles and structures.  The Welsh Government wants the users of social services to enjoy “a stronger voice and real control”.  The challenge is to take this aspiration beyond rhetoric and make it a reality.

- Could the idea of Co-operation offer an alternative, giving citizen-users of social support services a real say in the planning and delivery of that support?

- Could the idea of Co-operation offer an alternative to the competitive model of care, giving the citizen-user far more than a choice between providers; giving instead the status of a voting member with ownership of their own care and support agency?

The overwhelming support was positive. But only if a rainbow of stakeholders signed up to a long-term process of innovation, education, problem solving and evaluation.

- The problem of cost-driven procurement-led service commissioning needs to be addressed.  The promotion of Direct Payments and Self-Directed Support will be a part of the solution, giving citizens the chance to buy what they want without worrying about EU Procurement Regulations.

- The introduction by local authorities of contract specifications which insist on the meaningful involvement of users, and family carers where appropriate, in the governance of providers, will be another major step in the right direction. Frontline staff also have an inter-related ‘voice’ that needs to be heard.

- And the creation of a legislation platform that drives regulation in the direction of user-empowerment, whether directly or through access to advocacy and support, will also help to shape provider behaviour and create an integrated citizen-centred system.

These, and other challenges and possible solutions, were identified. To take things forward, a Foundation Project was suggested that would encompass the learning journey required.  Support came quickly from the meeting, with enthusiasm for practical follow up action.  This provides a great opportunity to support co-operatives in this important and growing sector.

Wales Progressive Co-operators, in partnership with Cartrefi Cymru, have been organising a programme of ‘Co-operative Social Services’ learning events, including a successful visit to Wales in February by Jean-Pierre Girard from Quebec, and a study tour of Cardiff, Neath, Lampeter, Newport, Newtown and Llandudno, in June, by John Restakis, the Canadian author of “Humanising the Economy – Co-operative in the age of Capital”. Details can be found at:

www.progressive-cooperators.org.uk/wales-group

Co-operators should be aware that the ideals and needs of the social care sector dovetail perfectly with the Co-operative ethos. There is also a mutually beneficial relationship to be forged between co-operative social care and other co-operative businesses, from community pharmacy and other services such as food, banking and insurance. And with an aging population, the potential demand for, and benefits from, co-operative solutions is enormous. Now that would be a fine legacy for UN Year of Co-operation 2012.

David Smith – Wales Progressive Co-operators

Adrian Roper – Cartrefi Cymru

People diagnosed with cancer, may find that their financial situation changes which can cause money worries. There is a lot of help available but it can be difficult to know where to start, so Tenovus  Cancer Support Advisor Gemma Leigh has put together the following ten tips to ensure you get all that you’re entitled to.

If you need any more advice, please speak to one of our Cancer Support Advisors by calling our Freephone Cancer Support Line on 0808 808 1010.

1.Work out how much money you have coming in.

Don’t forget to include any pensions or welfare benefits that you’re currently receiving.

2. Have you taken out any insurance?

This could be critical illness cover on your mortgage or insurance that you have taken out to protect your wages in the event that you are unable to work. Don’t forget to check any payment protection insurance that you may have taken out on any loans.

3.Are you entitled to any means-tested benefits?

These are benefits where your (and your partner if you have one) savings and income are taken into account and if they’re below a certain threshold they will be entitled to some money to ‘top them up’ to the threshold level. If you’re not sure what your threshold is, our Cancer Support Advisors can help.

4. Do you have any care or mobility needs?

If you are struggling with your personal care needs e.g. washing or dressing, then you may be entitled to Disability Living Allowance (if you are under 65 years old) or Attendance Allowance (if you are over the age of 65).

5. Does anybody in your household care for you?

If you and your carer meet certain conditions, then your carer may be entitled to Carer’s Allowance. If your carer receives state pension then they’re  unlikely to receive Carer’s Allowance, but it will mean that your threshold at step 3 is higher.

If your carer does not live with you, then him or her claiming Carer’s Allowance could affect your benefits so please seek advice from a specialist first.

6. Are you entitled to any help with your council tax bills?

Council Tax Benefit is one of the most under-claimed benefits – probably because is it so complicated. It is means-tested so it works to pay off some (or sometimes all) of your liability if your savings and income are below your relevant threshold. Again, if you’re not sure you should get advice from a specialist.

7. Are you entitled to any help with your housing costs?

Any help with your housing costs is means-tested. If you own your home (subject to a mortgage), then you may get help with the mortgage interest if your income and savings are low enough. This payment will be part of a mean-tested benefit (see step3) and if you are entitled to some help then this will be paid directly to your mortgage lender.

If you rent, then you may be entitled to some Housing Benefit (it is called Local Housing Allowance if you rent from a private landlord). Again, this depends on your circumstances and one of our Cancer Support Advisors can check this for you.

8. Help with health costs

You will be entitled to help with your travel costs if you are in receipt of Income Support, Income-based Jobseekers Allowance, income-related Employment and Support Allowance and the guarantee credit of Pension Credit. You may also qualify for help if you receive Child Tax Credits or Working Tax credits – but not always.

If you are not in receipt of any of the above benefits then you may still qualify under the ‘low income scheme’  this means that you may get ‘partial help’ and so receive some help with your health costs but not as much as under the main scheme.

9. Are there any grants that you could claim?

Some grants are means-tested but some are not. Many grants have very specific criteria such as you must live in a certain area or have had a certain type of job. Take a look at the Turn2us website – www.turn2us.org.uk – where you can search three thousand charities for grants.

10. Get Advice!

Unfortunately, the benefits system is quite complicated so in order to get everything that you are entitled to you should speak to a specialist, such as one of our Cancer Support Advisors. You can do this by calling our Freephone Cancer Support Line on 0808 808 1010.

Gemma Leigh is a Tenovus Cancer Support Advisor