social enterprise – The Community Planning Toolkit

Civil Society

Civil society is sometimes called ‘the third sector’, but it pre-dates either public authorities or private enterprise…

Civil society is sometimes called 'the third sector', but it pre-dates either public authorities or private enterprise...

In more detail

Civil society is all the things that exist because of what we do and plan together and not because someone either paid for them, or passed a law to say they should. It includes:

Families
Social networks (the patterns of who knows whom)
Communities
Community groups
Voluntary organisations
Charities and trusts

and the links between them. Other organisations like authorities and businesses contribute to civil society - although they are not part of it. Our social networks, for example, are influenced by the work we do and the services, like schools and places of worship, we may use. Some organisations, like social enterprises, or some large charities – which are part of civil society – also work as businesses or like public sector bodies.

Sometimes it is called the third sector or voluntary sector (as opposed to the private sector and the public sector). In fact, civil society is more accurately the ‘first sector’. Humans co-operated voluntarily to achieve common goals before we ever invented government or business.

Some accounts and descriptions of civil society focus on how it joins up with the public sector. These descriptions tend to over-emphasise the importance of large, organised voluntary organisations and charities run by professional employees. They may refer to ‘the voluntary sector’ rather than civil society. Other accounts and descriptions of civil society focus on the places where it most resembles business. Social enterprises figure largely in these descriptions. The truth is that whilst both of these types of organisation is part of civil society, most of civil society is made up by families; friends; neighbours; people helping each other out; informal volunteering – ‘lending a hand’; giving time and money to people who need it; and a multitude of small – often informal – community groups and the networks between them.

Businesses and public services make a massive difference to the quality of life in the community, but making anywhere a better place to live in the long run depends on local civil society, not what the council says or what businesses can do.

Key Facts:

Civil society is citizens linked by common interest and collective action: everything which happens in your neighbourhood which isn't the result of a decision by an elected official or because of a market price. It is the 'first sector' not the the 'third sector' because it pre-dates authorities and markets. Public services and private enterprise create opportunities, but civil society makes up the bedrock of wealth and wellbeing in almost any neighbourhood.

Page Links from here

Civil Society is a useful website with news, events and information relating to the 'third sector'

What is Civil Society was a BBC World Service radio series first broadcast in 2001 - notes and a link to listen to the programme are available on the BBC website

In this toolkit see:

Community

Community Groups

Social Capital

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

BIRMINGHAM COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT DEFINITION SHEET This sheet may be reproduced in paper or electromic or any other form but please mention it was made by Chamberlain Forum Limited for Birmingham City Council supported by Department for Communities and Local Government.

created: 2016-07-21 05:31:57

by: admin

status: f published

Co-operatives

If you are working together to improve the neighbourhood, then you might want to think about forming a neighbourhood co-op…

If you are working together to improve the neighbourhood, then you might want to think about forming a neighbourhood co-op...

In more detail

Co-operatives are democratically controlled associations which belong to the people set them up and are based on self-help, self-responsibility, democracy, equality, equity, and solidarity. Their shared ethical values – derived from those of the 19^th century Rochdale Pioneers - are honesty, openness, social responsibility, and caring for others. More than 17 million people in the UK are part of a co-operative and, in total, co-ops contribute more than £34bn to the economy every year. The video above from Co-ops UK explains what a co-operative is.

Abroad, in France, the top 3 cooperative banks have roughly the same level of revenue as HSBC, Lloyds and Barclays combined. The world’s largest industrial co-operative in Mondragon, in Spain, employs 75,000 workers – which is more than, for example, Google or Apple. Spanish football clubs, Barcelona and Real Madrid, are co-operatives.

In England, household names like the Co-op (of course), Nationwide Building Society and John Lewis are cooperatives. There are more than 200, mostly small-scale, housing cooperatives which provide affordable homes for their members. There are also food cooperatives, energy cooperatives, car-sharing clubs and social care cooperatives providing vital services on which their members depend. And an increasing number of neighbourhood timebanks and tool shares which work on cooperative principles.

Why Consider a Co-op?

A cooperative could be an appropriate form for an organisation which is set up to benefit and improve a neighbourhood because it:

is democratic and can only ever belong to its members
has open membership within its area - new members can join after it has been set up
can employ staff, undertake contracts and deliver services if necessary and/or can be used as a campaigning and educational body
works to benefit its members and the wider community as a whole
surpluses can only either be re-invested in the work of the co-op, or shared between its members
is built on the same values that underpin neighbourliness.

Becoming a co-operative, creates links to the wider co-operative movement, to potential collaboration and sources of support.

Membership is Ownership

In co-ops, membership is ownership. The one-member-one-vote rule applies in small organisations, social enterprises and community groups as well as in the big businesses like those above which work co-operatively.

What determines whether an organisation is a co-op are the values, principles and ways of working that it follows, rather than a given organisational structure. Co-ops can be constituted in a wide range of legal forms including as: Industrial and Provident Societies, non-profit companies and charitable incorporated organisations.

The video below is of Ed Mayo of Cooperatives UK talking about why he thinks the cooperative model is a better model for business:

Key Facts:

Co-ops are democratically owned and managed associations of people who share a common interest. They range from multi-million pound businesses to small, neighbourhood bodies. Regardless of their legal form, they share the principle of one member, one vote and a set of values and ways of working which distinguish co-ops from other businesses. For groups working together to improve the locality, it is worth thinking about setting up a neighbourhood co-op.

Page Links from here

Cooperatives UK is the networking body for co-ops which helps new and existing bodies working on cooperative lines. Examples of different sorts of neighbourhood group that are set up as cooperatives include:

London Community Neighbourhood Co-operative

Abram Ward Community Co-operative in Wigan

Headingley Development Trust in Leeds

Heart of Hasting Community Land Trust

Uplands Allotments Community Association in Birmingham

Preston Community Gateway

The Eldonians in Liverpool

On this website, see

Social Enterprise

Social Value

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

created: 2016-07-15 14:23:01

by: admin

status: f published

Locality

If you haven’t already used Locality’s information for community groups interested in neighbourhood planning, community asset development and running local services, you should look them up now…

If you haven't already used Locality's information for community groups interested in neighbourhood planning, community asset development and running local services, you should look them up now...

In more detail

Locality is a national network of locally-based and community-led organisations and social enterprises that aim to help neighbourhoods thrive. It was formed through the merger of the Development Trusts Association (DTA)and the British Association of Settlements and Social Action Centres (BASSAC) in 2011 and is a charity.

Locality‘s core membership is made up of ‘community anchor’ organisations which work along the lines of asset based regeneration. It provides membership services to those bodies and membership is open to locally-based community-led organisations from £100 a year. There are local networks and consortia of Locality members in some regions.

Most of Locality’s income and activity is accounted for by national programmes which tend to be funded by central government. These include:

the Neighbourhood Planning Support Programme which is funded by government;
the government’s Community Organising Programme;
the Community Rights Programme funded by the government to help people take up rights in the 2011 Localism Act
Our Place – which was the government’s neighbourhood budgeting pilot
the Enterprising Libraries programme funded by government to help find alternative ways of resourcing libraries.

The resources and advice available from these programmes is, in general, open to any group or organisation. For example, you don’t have to be a member of Locality to use the excellent resources presented on their Neighbourhood Planning and Your Community Rights websites.

Key Facts:

Locality is a non-profit organisation funded by government and belonging to its members which are local community trusts. It provides a very wide range of advice and information about community rights in the Localism Act and in particular information for groups that are interested and involved in neighbourhood planning.

Page Links from here

Contact:

Locality, 33 Corsham Street, London N1 6DR

http://locality.org.uk

my community rights website

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

created: 2016-07-11 11:55:30

by: admin

status: f published

Social Value

Improving a neighbourhood isn’t just about increasing property value and ensuring jobs. Communities are often more concerned with the state of shared wealth and wellbeing in a place – its social value…

Improving a neighbourhood isn't just about increasing property value and ensuring jobs. Communities are often more concerned with the state of shared wealth and wellbeing in a place - its social value...

In more detail

Social value is value that is held socially (shared between people) rather than included in the accounts of individual householders and businesses. It includes, for example:

the value of shared spaces and fresh air - streetscapes; landscapes; parks and community gardens
the value of social capital - having links with other people and knowing how to get things done through the community
the value of some human capital - skills and know-how that it is hard to put an economic value on (like parenting skills, for example)
the value of unpaid labour - the time spent by carers and neighbours and doing jobs for people without payment.

As well as these stores of social value, there is a whole area of it to do with how goods are made and services are delivered which is not reflected in their price. For example:

the use of local labour and materials - which can enhance the value of public services and construction works and reduce the amount of pollution involved
the way that the benefits of work are distributed between people - a part-time job for someone who is disabled or otherwise excluded from work is probably worth more than overtime to someone who already has a job
learning of new skills and ways of working- which may not be directly reflected in the quality of what is brought to market, but which enables us as a society to achieve more, and better, in future.

Social Value Act

The Public Services (Social Value) Act of 2012 came into force in 2013 and requires people who commission public services to think about how they can also secure wider social, economic and environmental benefits (ie social value). Before starting a procurement process, commissioners should think about whether the services they are going to buy, or the way they are going to buy them, could secure these benefits for their area or stakeholders. The video below shows Peter Holbrook of Social Enterprise UK explaining what the Social Value Act means:

Sustainable Communities Act

The Sustainable Communities Act 2007 enables councils - working in partnership with local communities - to make proposals as to how government can ‘assist councils in promoting the sustainability of local communities’. Itprovides an opportunity for local people, communities and councils to ask government to remove legislative or other barriers that prevent them from improving the economic, social and environmental well-being of their area (and thus add social value to it).

Power of General Competence

The Localism Act 2011 gives councils a 'power of general competence'. That is, councils are allowed to do anything that any other legal person (an individual or a business) can legally do so as to meet their aim which is to improve the economic, social and environmental wellbeing of their area. Councils can, for example, enter into partnerships to deliver new services or support initiatives which add to local well-being.

Key Facts:

Social value is shared wealth. It is why living in a neighbourhood with a good environment and a strong and inclusive community network is, for example, better than living in a badly-kept place where people don't talk to each other. Parliament requires public service providers to take social value into account when they commission services and enables councils to innovate and to ask government to change regulations which prevent communities from improving local social value.

Page Links from here

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

created: 2016-07-05 10:52:05

by: admin

status: f published

Community Right to Bid (assets of community value)

Community ‘Right to Bid’ is one of the rights included in the Localism Act. It could play a key part in wider community planning of your neighbourhood…

Community 'Right to Bid' is one of the rights included in the Localism Act. It could play a key part in wider community planning of your neighbourhood...

In more detail

‘Community right to bid’ is one of the powers enabled by the Localism Act 2011. It enables bona fide community groups to apply to the council to have land and buildings in their area registered as assets of community value.

Register of Assets of Community Value

To add an asset on to the local register, you have to show that the land and buildings in question have been used in the past as an asset with social value and that they could feasibly be used again for community benefit (although not necessarily in the same way). For example, a residents’ association could apply to the local council to have local swimming baths registered as an asset of community value so long as it is feasible that the baths building could be used for community benefit in future (perhaps as a community venue or community workspace even if not as a swimming baths). Listed assets can be owned by anyone – including private individuals and businesses as well as community groups or public agencies: this is about the local pub or corner shop as much as it is about the library or community centre.

The advantage of listing land or buildings as an asset of community value is this: if a listed asset comes up for sale, then the owner must give six months for community groups to put together an offer to buy it before they can sell it on the open market. The community right to bid is a brake on selling off assets with community value, not a prohibition. Even so, listing land and buildings in your area that serve a vital community function is a practical straightforward step you can take to make it clear that the communities which share your neighbourhood want to preserve and improve local wellbeing and will not easily see it diminished.

The video below is a webinar on Community Right to Bid led by Anton Schultz of Locality

Your local council must keep a register of assets of community assets. They can, however, refuse your application. The landowner can appeal against their decision, in any case and can refuse any bid you might be able to put to them in the event of wanting to sell the asset. Even so, listing assets can be a powerful way of sending a message about the determination of your community to preserve and improve local social value and wellbeing.

Key Facts:

Community 'Right to Bid' enables community groups to have the council register land and buildings that have social value listed as such (regardless of who owns them). Being on the council's register means that, when these assets are sold, the community has six months to put together a bid to buy them before theycan be sold on the open market.

Page Links from here

The Step-by-Step Guide to Community Right to Bid from Locality

Guide to Community Right to Bid is available as a PDF

CAMRA's guide to 'Listing your Local'

In the toolkit:

Community Asset Transfer

Community Assets

Development Trusts

Neighbourhood Companies

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

created: 2016-06-28 15:15:16

by: admin

status: f published

Neighbourhood Companies

Could the plan for turning round your neighbourhood be a business plan? Either as a stand-alone initiative or as part of the delivery of a community action plan, a neighbourhood company (what the French call regie de quartier, or district board) aims to improve the neighbourhood by involving local people – as paid staff, volunteers and Directors – in social enterprise.

In more detail

Think of neighbourhood companies as:

locally based community-led organisations
which have the betterment of the neighbourhood as a whole (as opposed to a particular community within it) as their objective
and which work as social enterprises, often providing a number of different services (their specialism is the neighbourhood, rather than functional).

In France, neighbourhood companies are called regies des quartiers (district boards) . In Spain, they might be set up as workers’ co-operatives. They are widespread in England, but we tend to call them by a variety of names. They include many development trusts; community trusts; local labour companies; neighbourhood management companies etc.

Likewise, they may be constituted in different ways. Some operate as non-profit Companies Limited by Guarantee (with or without Community Interest Company status); some are charities and some Charitable Incorporated Organisations. They may also be community benefit co-operatives. A few own significant amounts of housing and may be community-run housing associations or housing co-ops. Some are run by local businesses and may be called Business Associations or Town Centre Management Companies. They can all, perhaps, all be thought of as ‘neighbourhood companies’ – business-like and often generalist in the services they offer, but with a business advantage based on the synergies involved in working within a particular place.

The reasoning behind a neighbourhood company turns the logic of division of labour and mass production on its head. Rather than doing one thing everywhere, neighbourhood companies may aim, in principle to do anything, but only in one place. The locality – understanding how it and the people who share it work – is the source of their competitive advantage.

Regies des quartiers

In France, there are 140 district boards(regies des quartiers) covering 320 priority neighbourhoods – home to about 3 million people. Collectively, they employ about 8000 staff, and more volunteers, and are supported by 350 social landlords. Each board is run as an independent non-profit association with aim of improving the living environment of the neighbourhood by involving local people. The Board of Directors consists of local residents and representatives of the local authorities and social landlords that are active in the neighbourhood.

The boards sell goods and services and provide socially useful activities using local labour. As a baseline, most provide housing management related services to social landlords and neighbourhood management services (cleaner and greener type activities) for local authorities. They can be involved in refurbishing and renewing empty properties as well as maintenance and repairs. They may provide cleaning and maintenance services to local businesses and others. They may provide gardening, landscaping and the management of habitats and green spaces. Depending on local opportunities, the boards provide a very wide range of other services which can include building management and room hire, driving tuition, energy services, cycle maintenance and repairs, recycling services, motor vehicle repairs, cafes, childcare, laundries, local courier services, floristry, lift-and-shift services etc.

A vehicle for improving local services

Neighbourhood companies are not a new idea – perhaps just a fresh way of looking at what already exists. Depending on the priorities and opportunities in your neighbourhood, they might play a part alongside other community planning – including a neighbourhood plan – in making a better place to live by involving local communities. Getting directly involved in delivering services in the neighbourhood can give communities significant influence and 'leverage' (ability to get people and organisations to do things by working cooperatively with them) with other service providers - both public and private.

Key Facts:

Neighbourhood companies specialise in a place rather than a particular service or product. In English cities and towns, community development trusts and others may act as neighbourhood companies. In France, regies des quarteirs (neighbourhood boards) employ about 8000 workers in 320 neighbourhoods, home to aboput 3 million residents. Community led neighbourhood companies can focus and give direction to cooperative working between private and public services to make their neighbourhoods better places to live and do business.

Page Links from here

Development Trusts

Social Enterprise

Locality

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

created: 2016-06-22 11:55:49

by: admin

status: f published

Community Asset Transfer

What if under-used land and buildings which belong to public bodies could be taken over by passionate community groups and development trusts and used to provide services to the community…

What if under-used land and buildings which belong to public bodies could be taken over by passionate community groups and development trusts and used to provide services to the community...

In more detail

Community Asset Transfer (CAT) is the process by which publicly owned land and buildings can be sold either freehold or leasehold to non-profit bodies at less than market value. CAT can lead to the rejuvenation of neglected public assets - run-down buildings and unloved patches of land.

The video above which suggests how community asset transfer can build community and improve neighbourhoods is also featured in this presentation on CAT made by Hannah Senior in 2013:

The enthusiasm of volunteers and residents to improve these assets when they are transferred to community owenrship has been matched in some cases by the ability of the new owners to attract capital investment from charitable sources including the National Lottery. The real ongoing benefit, however, is the value of the services which community groups are able to provide using previously tired assets.

Linda Hines of Witton Lodge Community Association interviewed on site, by Nick Booth of podnosh, at Perry Common Community Hall which was transferred through CAT to community ownership and has been transformed as a result.

Economic Justification

CAT is justified economically by comparing the additional economic value which the public body would get from the sale of the asset on the open market with the social value which the public body is able to enable by transferring it through CAT.

For example, a patch of disused health service land could be sold on the open market for £5000 to provide two car parking spaces. Alternatively, it could be transferred through CAT to a community group that would pay £500 for it. The group would turn it into a community garden which would produce benefits for local people and a local mental health project and might lead to greater neighbourliness, improved community safety and better recovery from mental ill-health. If the health service trust and its police and council partners value these benefits as being worth more than £4500, then they should choose use CAT to sell it to the community group.

The video below is about CAT in Penny Lane, Liverpool. It was produced by the Asset Transfer Unit (which was set up the Development Trusts Association, which was one of the bodies that came together to form Locality):

Transparency, Fairness and Social Valuation

CAT is potentially open to abuse where it involves transferring public assets to private (albeit non-profit and local) organisations without having a robust means for valuing social worth in place; without sufficient transparency; and without advertising opportunities to a wide range of potential bidders.

For example, a patch of land worth £5000 is sold to a community trust which is in fact a non-profit company owned by members of a local family for £500 on the basis that they will use it for 'community benefit'. What they actually do with it is to create car parking spaces for visitors to their office base from which they provide mental health services on contract with an NHS trust. The person who made the decision to sell them the land at 10% of the full market value is a friend of the family.

Support

The video below presents help and support available for CAT from My Community:

Key Facts:

Community Asset Transfer (CAT) is the process by which underused publicly owned land and buildings may be sold to non-profit organisations at less than market value in return for providing increased social value in the form of services to the local community. CAT has successfully turned ailing assets around, but there is potential for abuse. A robust approach to calculating social value, transparency and advertising opportunities to acquire assets widely all help to prevent abuse.

Page Links from here

Birmingham City Council's Community Asset Transfer website describes one council's approach to CAT

The My Community Rights site section on Community Asset Transfer presents an overview and a link to the toolkit on CAT

More videos about CAT are available on the Asset Transfer Unit YouTube channel

Housing Association Charitable Trust has produced a toolkit for housing providers on Asset Transfer

Have a look at Coin Street Community Builders on the South Bank in London which was one of the groups that helped to pioneer development trusts and CAT

In this toolkit see:

Social Value

Community Assets

Development Trusts

Neighbourhood Companies

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

created: 2016-06-16 11:18:43

by: admin

status: f published

Development Trusts

Community assets can be managed to provide services and the money made re-invsted back into community activities. Development trusts are community-led organisations that are frequently set up to achieve this…

In more detail

A development trust is a partnership organisation which brings together people and organisations with a stake in a locality to enable them – through shared ownership of assets – to lead and attract investment in making the neighbourhood a better place to live. Typically, a local development trust is a body set up to manage a local asset by people and organisations with an interest in the improvement of an area to:

carry out improvements to the locality including the local physical and social environment and the skills of local people
provide services to earn income and enable others to carry out improvements to the area
lobby for and promote the improvement of the area by larger organisations including in partnership with local people and organisations.

Development Trust Structures

A trust is non-profit body which operates as a social enterprise: in a business-like way, but generating social value as well as economic value and re-investing any surplus into its own development and that of the area. Trusts do not have a particular legal structure and they can be set up as non-profit companies limited by guarantee (CLGs), with or without Community Interest Company (CIC) status, co-operatives or charities (including as Charitable Incorporated Organisations). In order to achieve their objects, trusts must be able to enter into contracts to employ staff, pay contractors, charge customers etc and so need to be incorporated (have their own legal identity).

Asset Based Regeneration

Local development trusts are a form of neighbourhood company. They are often associated with and active exponents of an approach to local development called asset based regeneration. This was developed by a number of pioneering trusts from the 1960s onwards and become the guiding philosophy of the Development Trusts Association which merged to form Locality in 2011.

Asset based regeneration emphasises the ownership of local assets (as opposed, for example to their management or the ability to earn fees) in order to generate revenue that can be re-invested in the area. Although the most obvious asset for development trusts to use ion this way might seem to be housing (which generates ready and reliable revenue in the form of rents), not many trusts own housing but tend to own areas of land and community buildings instead.

Key Facts:

Development Trusts are community-led bodies which may be supported by local businesses and public agencies as well as individual members. They are generally set up to manage a lcoal asset or group of assets - typically including a building which is used as a meeting place and offers workspace. Any profit they make from services they provide is re-invested in improving the neighbourhood.

Page Links from here

Locality is the network for development trusts and other similar bodies.

In this toolkit see:

Neighbourhood Companies

Community Assets

Social Enterprise

Community Asset Transfer

Locality

OR you can use the navigation menu above right to look at other parts of the toolkit.

created: 2016-06-16 11:08:47

by: admin

status: f published