Big deal or no big deal?

With David Cameron's "big society" playing big again in his conference speech, Ruth Patrick ponders whether she's right to be suspicious
 
It the impressionable age of ten, my mum promised me the biggest box of chocolates money could buy on the day Margaret Thatcher was finally ousted from British politics.

For someone whose allegiance to the left, and related distrust of the Tories, is almost inbuilt, it is all too tempting immediately to trash any and every Conservative policy idea.

However, as Ed Miliband said in his first speech as Labour Party leader, it is critical to move beyond reactionary opposition, otherwise we’ll always have the adversarial, Punch-and-Judy-style politics that turns us off and bores us.

When the Govern­ment comes up with a good idea, we should celebrate it and offer to help turn proposals into policy.

Applying this logic to David Cameron’s much-quoted ambition to build a “big society”, it is timely to consider whether this endeavour deserves our support. First of all, build­ing the “big society” seems to need an invigorated focus on empowering communities and encouraging volunteer­ing and charitable giving. It also requires decentralising power from the state to the town hall, and then further down to people themselves at community level and the delivery of services by the voluntary sector.

As Cameron himself puts it, “the big society is about a huge culture change where people ... feel both free and powerful enough to help themselves.” In the name of the “big society”, free schools are being set up, a “big society” bank is being launched to help fund social enterprise, and regulation and targets are to be stripped away to give local authorities more power to set local priorities.

There’s certainly potential in empowering communities and individuals, particularly for disabled people who, as service users, still need more power and control over the care, support and services they receive.

Similarly, a policy stance that values and respects volunteering could be good news for the thousands (if not millions) of disabled people who contribute to society through volunteering.

At the same time, there is concern that “big society” rhetoric is a cover for cuts, a cunning way to justify massive state retrenchment and subtly shift respons­ibility for improving society from the state and onto individuals, with worrying consequences for those already struggling to cope.

Further, there is tension between the Government’s interest in the voluntary sector’s role in this “big society” and its plans to cut some £734 million from voluntary projects.

Critically, the “big society” ideal remains unformed, which means that people can still contribute to what it does and should mean. This leaves a clear role for disabled people and their organisations.

So if you are campaigning, wrap up your proposals for policy change in the rhetoric of building the “big society” and help reshape this Conservative agenda.

After all, the Tories’ manifesto was titled “An invitation to join the Government of Britain” and I was always taught that it’s very rude to refuse an invite without good cause!