David Camerons "Big Society" Privatisation of Public Services: Please Respond on the Government Website
Open Public Services White Paper
Government Cabinet Office, 11 July 2011
High-quality public services are the right of everyone. The Open Public Services White Paper sets out how the Government will improve public services. By putting choice and control in the hands of individuals and neighbourhoods, public services will become more responsive to peoples' needs.
The White Paper sets out the government's approach to public services by applying five key principles:
- Choice – wherever possible we will increase choice
- Decentralisation – Power should be decentralised to the lowest appropriate level
- Diversity – Public services should be open to a range of providers
- Fairness – We will ensure fair access to public services
- Accountability – Public services should be accountable to users and taxpayers.
The White Paper will be followed over the summer by a wide-ranging discussion with individuals, communities, public sector staff, providers and others with an interest in how public services are delivered. We want to hear from the views of everyone working in and using public services about how it can turn its vision for high quality, efficient and modern public services into reality.
You can give us your views now on the Open Public Services website.
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David Cameron promises to 'end state's monopoly' over public services
guardian.co.uk, 11 July 2011
Prime minister unveils white paper that promises to allow private providers to deliver more public services
David Cameron has unveiled plans to end the era of "old fashioned" delivery of public services by allowing almost all of them to be opened up to competition from the private and voluntary sector.
In a speech in east London, Cameron said that the provisions in the Open Public Services white paper would mark the first step on the road to a "better, fairer country" in which people enjoy more choice, less bureaucracy, improved services and equal access for rich and poor.
The prime minister promised to loosen "the grip of state control" by bringing in a "big society" approach and putting "power in people's hands". The contents of the white paper would be felt in "every state school, hospital and prison, by every doctor, teacher, parent, patient and citizen", he said.
Cameron made clear he was "absolutely determined" to see through changes which he said were not just about improving schools and hospitals but represented a "vital part of building a bigger, stronger society that is so central to my vision for our country".
"I know there are those who thought we might be pulling back or losing heart for the task ahead," he said. "So let me assure you of this: we are as committed to modernising our public services as we have ever been. I'm not going to make the mistakes of my predecessors … blocking reform, wasting opportunities and wasting time. This is a job that urgently needs to be done, and we are determined to see it through."
Unions responded furiously to the proposals, accusing the coalition government of seeking to break up the public services.
Under the changes, every public service except for national security, frontline policing and the judiciary will be opened up to providers from the private and voluntary sector.
A "general right to choose" in areas such as education, health, social care and housing would be enshrined in law, with new powers for the ombudsman to act as an "enforcer of choice in public services".
The consumer organisation Which? will also extend its role as an advocate for consumers in the private sector to cover the public sector too.
"This white paper says loud and clear that it shouldn't matter if providers are from the state, private or voluntary sector - as long as they offer a great service," the prime minister said. "The old narrow, closed, state monopoly is dead."
Cameron said that while public services were centralised "with all the right intentions", the impact had been "incredibly damaging" to users.
Under his proposals, communities will be allowed to set up neighbourhood councils to commission services on a hyper-local level, individuals will get more personal budgets to buy their own services and the use of payment by results will be expanded to encourage markets to develop across the public sector.
Cameron made the case for the need to shake up provision by drawing on his own past experiences of trying to get the right wheelchair for his late disabled son, Ivan. He was still hearing too many stories from others that the right wheelchair only arrives once the child has almost outgrown it, he said.
As another example, the prime minister seized on children who qualify for free school meals who are "half as likely" to get five good GCSEs as their better off peers.
"The last time they counted, just 40 people who had had free school meals were going to Oxbridge – out of 80,000," said Cameron. "We've got a welfare state that doesn't deliver welfare, that doesn't get people back into work but traps them in poverty instead.
"So let me tell you what our change looks like. It's about ending the old big government, top-down way of running public services … releasing the grip of state control and putting power in people's hands. The old dogma that said Whitehall knows best – it's gone. There will be more freedom, more choice and more local control. Ours is a vision of open public services."
The white paper was published on the same day that private care home provider Southern Cross announced it was closing down.
But Cameron's official spokesman brushed aside any suggestion that Southern Cross's failure cast doubt on the wisdom of allowing private sector firms to deliver public services.
The spokesman told reporters: "Obviously, the Southern Cross deal pre-dated this government and it was possible for private sector providers to be involved in the provision of some public services in the past. Yes, we are talking about increasing diversity of provision, but we also need to make sure that there are appropriate checks and balances in place and that people are looked after."
Cameron first laid out his plans to roll back the boundaries of the state to allow private providers to deliver more public services in February, but it is widely understood that the plans have since been downgraded as result of an internal battle with the Liberal Democrats.
The Lib Dems have sought to ensure that any outsourcing and market-driven reforms maintain a strong degree of accountability, prompting a Downing Street source to describe the resulting document as "more greenish than white".
Dave Prentis, the leader of Unison, said the white paper was "just another stepping stone towards Cameron's same old goal to privatise public services".
"If this is Cameron's big idea, he needs to go back to the drawing board.
"The collapse of Southern Cross today gives a clear warning as to what happens when you let the market run public services. The sale of elderly care homes started out small, but it wasn't long before private equity companies got their teeth into the market. Now that the profits are less, they want out, and thousands of elderly residents and their families are bewildered and angry over their uncertain future.
"Not only does Cameron want to wash his hands of providing public services, he wants cut price privatisation. He is removing protections on workers' pay and conditions, creating a race to the bottom, so that services are more attractive to private buyers."
Confidential documents obtained by the Guardian under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that ministers have been privately advised to allow schools and hospitals to fail if the government is to succeed in its overhaul of public services.
They reveal research by civil servants warning that markets are susceptible to failure, and that costs could in fact rise unless a true market is created by allowing public services to collapse if they are unsuccessful.
It opens up the potential for schools, hospitals, social care systems and nurseries to fold without the government stepping in to prop them up – a revelation described as "appalling" by Labour.
The documents obtained by the Guardian were prepared by civil servants as part of an internal government review into the consequences for democratic accountability of the coalition's localism, big society and outsourcing reforms that are integral to the white paper.
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Ministers urged to let schools and hospitals fail to hasten reforms
The Guardian, Monday 11 July 2011
White paper argues for ending the state monopoly on public services and putting the power in people's hands
Ministers have been privately advised to allow schools and hospitals to fail if the government is to succeed in its overhaul of public services, confidential government documents reveal.
The prime minister announced on 11 July 2011 long-awaited plans to "end the state's monopoly" over public services and give people more "choice and control" over what they use, in a white paper opening up swaths of the public sector to private companies, charities and mutuals. David Cameron will claim that the welfare state is failing, and promise to "release the grip of state control and [put] power in people's hands".
Under the plans, communities will be allowed to set up neighbourhood councils to commission services on a hyper-local level, individuals will get more personal budgets to buy their own services and the use of payment by results will be expanded to encourage markets to develop across the public sector.
But documents obtained by the Guardian under the Freedom of Information Act reveal research by civil servants warning that markets are susceptible to "failure" and costs could in fact rise unless a true market is created by allowing public services to collapse if they are unsuccessful.
It opens up the potential for schools, hospitals, social care systems and nurseries to fold without the government stepping in to prop them up. Labour called it an "appalling revelation".
The open services white paper will be launched by the prime minister today in a speech in which he will say: "We've got a welfare state that doesn't deliver welfare, that doesn't get people back into work but traps them in poverty instead.
"So let me tell you what our change looks like. It's about ending the old big government, top-down way of running public services … releasing the grip of state control and putting power in people's hands.
"The old dogma that said 'Whitehall knows best' – it's gone. There will be more freedom, more choice and more local control. Ours is a vision of open public services." It is widely understood that the plans contained in the white paper have been downgraded since Cameron first revealed details in a speech in February, after an internal coalition battle with the Liberal Democrats, who have sought to ensure that any outsourcing and market-driven reforms maintain a strong degree of accountability. One Downing Street source described it as "more greenish than white" now. However, Cameron will say: "Let me assure you of this: we are as committed to modernising our public services as we have ever been."
The documents obtained by the Guardian were prepared by civil servants as part of an internal government review into the consequences for democratic accountability of the coalition's localism, big society and outsourcing reforms that are integral to today's white paper.It was ordered by the cabinet secretary Sir Gus O'Donnell.
One paper on "the role of choice and competition in driving value for money in public services" warns that if more suppliers move into the public sector, costs could rise.
"This problem is mitigated if the system allows for provider exit as well as entry – and indeed the evidence suggests it is exit which drives efficiency ... There is also evidence from the private sector that a significant share of productivity growth is due to entry and exit processes.
"But exit of providers (eg school closure) may be controversial and unpopular and an appropriate failure regime must be designed," it warns.
The document also:
• Concludes there is a benefit in choice and competition in driving up standards, but that it works best where there are fixed prices in health for operations, or in education per pupil, otherwise there is a risk that companies will simply compete by undercutting each other. Drawing on evidence from the first major wave of privatisation in the 1990s, it says "providers will compete on price but quality may suffer".
• Highlights the potential for "market failures" in the public sector, saying some areas may not be appropriate. "In particular, it is worth noting that if the service is complex; time-critical; and used infrequently, (for instance accident and emergency services), it may be difficult for users to make an informed choice."• It warns that wealthier people may be better placed to exercise choice in which services they access, because they are more likely to be able to travel further for the school or hospital they want.
Tessa Jowell, the shadow cabinet office minister, said that the potential for allowing schools and hospitals to collapse was "an appalling revelation".
She said: "The education of children and the treatment of the sick should not be treated as a commodity to be traded, as if healthcare and educations were chocolate bars or washing powder."
A Downing Street source said: "The paper will set out that there will always be a role for external bodies independent of government – regulators – with powers to ensure proper financial management and to intervene to ensure proper continuity of service."
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Competition plan for state services unveiled
The Independent, 11 July 2011
Almost all of public sector services are to be opened up to competition from the private and voluntary sector, Prime Minister David Cameron announced on 11 July 2011.
Mr Cameron said that the provisions in the Open Public Services White Paper, published today, would mark the first step on the road to a "better, fairer country" in which people enjoy more choice, less bureaucracy, improved services and equal access for rich and poor.
But his proposals met a furious response from the unions, who accused the coalition Government of seeking to break up the public services.
Speaking in east London as the White Paper was unveiled to the House of Commons, Mr Cameron said he was "absolutely determined" to see through wholesale reform of the public services.
Under the changes, every public service except for national security, frontline policing and the judiciary will be opened up to providers from the private and voluntary sector.
The White Paper floats proposals to enshrine in law "a general right to choose" in areas like education, health, social care and housing, with new powers for the ombudsman services to act as an "enforcer of choice in public services".
And consumer organisation Which? will extend its role as advocate for consumers in the private sector to cover the public sector too.
"This White Paper says loud and clear that it shouldn't matter if providers are from the state, private, or voluntary sector - as long as they offer a great service," said Mr Cameron.
And he added: "The old narrow, closed, state monopoly is dead."
Unveiling the proposed reforms in the House of Commons, Cabinet Office minister Oliver Letwin said they would provide "increased choice and power for service-users, so that we can provide access to excellence for all".
At present, the wealthy are able to pay for good-quality services where the state sector provision is not up to scratch, while the poor are forced to accept whatever they are given, said Mr Letwin.
And he told MPs: "We need to give everybody the same choice in and the same power over the services they receive that well-off people have already."
The reforms would be driven by the principles of choice, decentralisation, diversity, fair access and accountability, he said.
This would include personal budgets for social care users by 2013; funding following the user in state schools, universities, childcare and the NHS; premium payments for school pupils and healthcare patients from disadvantaged backgrounds; easily accessible information about public service performance; and payment by results for providers of services such as welfare-to-work, offender rehabilitation, and drug and alcohol treatment.
Mr Cameron said the launch of the reforms was an "important day" for the country and the coalition Government, and their impact would be felt "in every state school, hospital and prison, by every doctor, teacher, parent, patient and citizen".
Today's White Paper was initially expected to be published in February, when Mr Cameron provoked union fury by promising a "presumption" that private providers could run all but the most sensitive public services.
The delay fuelled speculation about bitter fights within the Government over the major policy initiative, including reports that Mr Cameron's policy guru Steve Hilton came close to quitting.
But while the language may have been toned down, Mr Cameron insisted he has in no way watered down his plans.
"I know there are those who thought we might be pulling back or losing heart for the task ahead," he said.
"So let me assure you of this: we are as committed to modernising our public services as we have ever been. I'm not going to make the mistakes of my predecessors - blocking reform, wasting opportunities and wasting time.
"This is a job that urgently needs to be done, and we are determined to see it through."
He described public services as "the backbone of the country" but complained that they still operate with a "take-what-you're-given" philosophy that has failed sufficiently to close gaps between the life quality of the rich and poor.
"I know what our public services can do and how they are the backbone of this country. But I know too that the way they have been run for decades - old-fashioned, top-down, take-what-you're-given - is just not working for a lot of people," said the Prime Minister.
"Public services were centralised with all the right intentions: to drive progress through from on high, to keep tabs on how that progress was going with targets and rules and inspections. But the impact of this has been incredibly damaging."
Public services were "failing on fairness", with people in the poorest neighbourhoods dying seven years earlier than those in the richest; children from disadvantaged families half as likely to get five good GCSE passes as their better-off contemporaries; and just 40 students on free school meals getting one of the 80,000 places at Oxford or Cambridge universities, said Mr Cameron.
"And we're not getting value for money either," he said. "Total public spending increased by 57% in real terms from 1997 to 2010. But on no measure can we claim that things have improved by more than 50%.
"Even if we weren't deeply in debt, we would have a responsibility to do something about this."
Setting out his vision for the future of public services, Mr Cameron said: "It's about ending the old big government, top-down way of running public services and bringing in a Big Society approach; releasing the grip of state control and putting power in people's hands.
"The old dogma that said Whitehall knows best - it's gone. There will be more freedom, more choice and more local control."
Mr Cameron insisted that diversity was not a "threat" to essential services, but "a promise of better public services for everyone".
But unions warned that the Government's plans - published on the day that private care home company Southern Cross announced it was closing down - would put quality public services at risk.
TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: "This is nothing less than a manifesto to break up our public services, smuggled out while all attention is focused on the misdeeds of News International.
"Yet on the day Southern Cross's failure underlines just how dangerous introducing the profit motive into public service can be, people should be very afraid at what these proposals could mean.
"Of course they are skilfully wrapped up in warm words, but when the Prime Minister talks of charities and voluntary groups, he means parcelling up public services for private companies.
"When he talks of ending top-down control, he really means introducing a postcode lottery with few winning tickets, and when he talks of fairness he means new opportunities for the sharp-elbowed middle classes to push others aside."
Unison leader Dave Prentis said: "If this is Cameron's big idea, he needs to go back to the drawing board. Today's White Paper is just another stepping stone towards Cameron's same old goal to privatise public services.
"The collapse of Southern Cross today gives a clear warning as to what happens when you let the market run public services.
"The sale of elderly care homes started out small, but it wasn't long before private equity companies got their teeth into the market. Now that the profits are less, they want out, and thousands of elderly residents and their families are bewildered and angry over their uncertain future.
"Not only does Cameron want to wash his hands of providing public services, he wants cut-price privatisation. He is removing protections on workers' pay and conditions, creating a race to the bottom, so that services are more attractive to private buyers."
Unite assistant general secretary Gail Cartmail said the "utterly wrong-headed" proposals would involve passing "vast parts of the public realm into uncertain hands".
"The public are not fooled. They know that this is not about improving service quality. Service quality was sacrificed the day George Osborne cut council budgets by 28%," said Ms Cartmail.
"This is entirely about shrinking the society we have built up through our taxes and the endeavours of working people in the generations since the war to build a fairer Britain where quality services were available to all."
Mark Serwotka, leader of the Public and Commercial Services union, said: "This has nothing to do with people power, it's about handing more of our public services over to private companies so they can make massive profits at taxpayers' expense."
And Bob Crow, leader of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union, said: "This Government would privatise the air that we breathe if they thought that they could get away with it.
"If David Cameron seriously thinks he can flog off what's left of the family silver to the same greed merchants who created this crisis, then he will have the fight of his life on his hands."
Paul Kenny, leader of the GMB union, said the reforms amounted to "a dangerous re-threading of the bald tyre that led to today's crash at Southern Cross" and "a formula for taxpayers' cash ending up in offshore tax havens".
Mr Kenny said: "That the Government should seek to dress up this extension of privatisation on the day Southern Cross suspended its shares shows the extent to which it has lost touch with the real world."
Sir Merrick Cockell, chairman of the Local Government Association, said: "Public services are more accountable, more efficient and more in tune with the needs and aspirations of local people when they are delivered locally. Now ministers need to deliver on their commitment to let go and devolve services down to the local level.
"We urge Government not to hold back. No department should consider itself above the need to break up the centralised power they have held over local areas.
"It is vital that the devolution of power from Whitehall down to town halls and communities is comprehensive and not tied up in red tape."
Co-operative Party general secretary Michael Stephenson said: "Cameron's faux mutualism is not 'people power' - it's simply bogus.
"The thinking that should have been done clearly has not, so the accountability mechanisms to make public services genuinely democratic are not there.
"Oliver Letwin today proposes privatisation and calls it 'creating employee mutuals', just as 20 years ago he proposed the poll tax and called it a 'community charge'. As usual, the small print does not match up to the Cameron rhetoric."
Shadow Cabinet Office minister Tessa Jowell said: "This White Paper contains few new ideas and even fewer new proposals. Having promised radical change, the Tory-led Government are lagging behind their earlier rhetoric and are yet to catch up with the last Labour government.
"Our public services face significant challenges over the coming years, not least as a result of cuts that are too far and too fast. Yet it appears that the Government are simply obsessed with spin and presentation rather than providing the reform that our public services need."
But Chief Secretary to the Treasury Danny Alexander described the White Paper as "an important milestone in the Government's mission to make public services better for the people that use them".
"This paper alone won't change people's lives, but the principles it sets out will shape and improve the public services people use for generations to come," said Mr Alexander.
"It will give people more choice, make services fairer, devolve power from the centre and make services more accountable to the people that use them."
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White paper opens public services to privatisation
Unison, 11 July 2011
Commenting on Cameron's ‘Open Public Services' white paper, Dave Prentis, General Secretary of UNISON, said:
"If this is Cameron's big idea, he needs to go back to the drawing board. Today's white paper is just another stepping stone towards Cameron's same old goal to privatise public services.
"The collapse of Southern Cross today gives a clear warning as to what happens when you let the market run public services. The sale of elderly care homes started out small, but it wasn't long before private equity companies got their teeth into the market. Now that the profits are less, they want out, and thousands of elderly residents and their families are bewildered and angry over their uncertain future.
"Not only does Cameron want to wash his hands of providing public services, he wants cut price privatisation. He is removing protections on workers' pay and conditions, creating a race to the bottom, so that services are more attractive to private buyers.”
Notes for editors:
UNISON reports highlight dangers of privatisation.
* A UNISON survey by Paul Gosling exposes the shocking state in which privatisation has left the care industry and the disasters waiting to happen. The evidence proves that privatisation is a risky experiment, as these councils revealed, money was drained, standards were driven down, and they had little control over the services.
* A survey by APSE, for UNISON, reveals that half of councils who had outsourced their services had to bring them back in-house because of financial failures and inefficiency. 60% of council officers surveyed said the need to improve efficiency and reduce service costs had led them to consider bringing services back in-house. After cost, 44% of respondents said there was a need to improve service quality.
* A UNISON report - ‘Mutual Benefit?' - reveals that increased marketisation will lead to a hike in bureaucracy. Mutuals are in danger of being bolted onto a competitive market for services, pitting them against private sector providers. Community-based mutuals will struggle to compete, as private companies undercut them, and outright privatisation of public services is the likely outcome.
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People will see through Cameron's privatisation plan
Public and Commercial Service Union, 11 July 2011
Speaking ahead of prime minister David Cameron's speech about 'public service reform', PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said:
"This has nothing to do with people power, it's about handing more of our public services over to private companies so they can make massive profits at taxpayers' expense.
"But we don't think many people doubt this. With ministers rumbled trying to mislead the public about the costs of public sector pensions, and the prime minister trying to defend his decision to hire the disgraced former News of the World editor Andy Coulson, this is a government that has lost the trust of the public.
"The government can not be trusted to act in the wider public interest and it can not be trusted with the welfare state. People will see through these plans and the deliberately misleading use of words like 'fairness' and 'balance' to cushion the blow.
"Just like our members who work for My Civil Service Pension - the first government agency earmarked to become a so-called 'mutual', lauded as a co-operative venture - saw through the rhetoric and spin, and rejected the plans outright, taking strike action to defend their service from privatisation.
"Public services and the welfare state do not discriminate, they look after millions, while David Cameron just looks after the millionaires. No private health or welfare system in the world has ever opened its doors to the needy regardless of their ability to pay.
"Bound by the need to make profits, the private sector can never run services for the benefit of all. We do not want our country run for profit, we want investment in our public services to make them better."
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Richard Murphy, Tax Research UK, 12 July 2011
As the GMB reported on 11 July 2011:
Almost half of Southern Cross care homes are owned by companies based outside the UK, including hundreds registered in tax havens, according to a union dossier.
The GMB said 199 homes are registered in the Cayman islands, 43 in Guernsey, 41 in Gibraltar, 39 in Jersey, four in the British Virgin islands and one in the Isle of Man.
The union said it had established the names of 80 landlords who own 615 of the 750 homes but was still trying to find out details of the other owners.
National officer Justin Bowden said: "Southern Cross may be on its last legs but for Southern Cross's 31,000 residents and 43,000 staff, this looks like a case of ‘out of the frying pan, into the fire'.
"These 80 landlords are a rag-bag bunch whose number includes overseas interests, tax dodgers and in some cases ‘identity still unknown'. Many themselves are in financial difficulties.
"All this spells months more uncertainty and worry for residents and staff. Where is Government in this care scandal? The ears of the 31,000 elderly and vulnerable residents and 43,000 staff must be ringing from the deafening silence from Downing Street.”
Cameron says he is in favour of transparency, accountability and obligation in public services. This, though, is the reality: we get offshore companies, completely opaque, accountable to no one, with no financial information available on public record, ending up as the landlords and operators of care homes for the elderly in this country.
- It's sickening.
- It's wrong.
- It's as opaque as it is possible to be.
- It lacks all forms of accountability.
- There is no protection to those who need it within such a system.
Cameron wants to devolve responsibility from the state to the corporate entity. But as my research has shown, 20% of all companies in the United Kingdom disappear each year without question being asked. That is a complete failure of corporate responsibility.
In addition I've shown that the government does not ask almost one third of companies to submit tax returns each year. That's the behaviour of a cowardly state.
Of those 1.8 million companies that are asked to submit tax returns, 600,000 do not submit them and they are not pursued for any penalty for not doing so. That is the behaviour of companies who know they can ride roughshod over the government: a cowardly government; a government that is not willing to enforce regulation to ensure transparency, accountability and the obligation to pay tax.
And Cameron presides over a government that is responsible for more tax havens in this world than any other, and he's doing nothing about it.
To argue that the functions of state should be passed to corporations when regulation of corporations is so weak, and is known to be so weak, is the act of a man who is both a coward and a fool. Cameron knows that if he does what he proposes accountability, transparency and responsibility will all go by the wayside. But he says otherwise. That's grossly dishonest.
If there is to be any further devolvement of any responsibility of any sort from the state in this country to the private sector then the rules by which the private sector operates have to be enforced and enhanced.
- Companies must be made to account.
- Their directors must be held accountable if they do not.
- Tax havens must be shattered open and the information within them brought into the public domain.
- Full accounts of every corporate entity must be on public record.
- Country by country reporting must be the norm.
- Corporate social responsibility reporting should not be an optional extra: it should be a requirement of all companies of any size.
- Tax avoidance, and the transfer of profits generated from state funded activity to tax havens outside the UK should be banned.
- Personal liability for those persons who act in breach of trust, who have committed fraud, who have deliberately assisted their companies to evade tax, and who've misrepresented accounting information should be rigourously enforced.
Then, and only then can the public sector be satisfied that the private sector can undertake the tasks that they may wish to transfer to it.
Until then, any transfer of services to the private sector involves unknown and very obviously significant, and dangerous, risks for the users of the services in question and that is wholly unacceptable and an act of gross irresponsibility on the part of any politician.
Which is why Cameron's Big Society must be stopped, now
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From 'no such thing as society' to 'big society'. Spot the difference
The Guardian, 11 July 2011
The spooky similarities between Thatcher's & Cameron's rhetoric, apart from the "spin”
As the government unveils its blueprint for public services reform, Peter Beresford compares David Cameron's approach with Margaret Thatcher's
The idea of "big society" looms as large over this government as Big Brother did over 1984. The big question is how is this idea different to previous Conservative thinking on the subject? As prime minister from 1979 to 1990, Mrs Thatcher told us there was no such thing as society. She said the state was inefficient as a service provider; that public expenditure inhibited wealth creation and created dependency, and that we should turn instead to the market.
She aimed to cut public expenditure. She reduced welfare benefits and stigmatized people receiving them as dependent and scroungers. She called for an expansion of self-help and voluntarism. Her critics said that she weakened UK economic performance, increased economic inequality and reduced social mobility. They argued that her reforms increased social divisions, undermined social cohesion and had particularly damaging effects on the regions, Scotland and Wales and their manufacturing industries.
She actually massively increased public expenditure on welfare benefits through increasing unemployment. Her reduction of expenditure on the health service seriously undermined its performance and meant that being seen as looking after the NHShas become a watchword ever since for any leader who wishes to be elected and remain in power.
By contrast, David Cameronhas argued for "big society" as core to his policy approach and political belief. He believes that the state is inefficient as a service provider; that public expenditure inhibits wealth creation and creates dependency and we should instead turn to the market.
He has aimed to cut public expenditure. He has reduced welfare benefits and stigmatized people receiving them as dependent and scroungers. He has called for an expansion of self-help and voluntarism. He has presided over the weakening of UK economic performance. His period in office has witnessed the extension of economic inequality and reduced social mobility. His reforms have come in for criticism for increasing social divisions, undermining social cohesion and for having particularly damaging effects on the regions, Scotland and Wales and their manufacturing industries.
He is set on reducing public expenditure on welfare benefits, but rising unemployment through the loss of public and private sector jobs is likely to increase the welfare bill. There are widespread fears that his reorganisation of and reduction of expenditure on the NHS will seriously undermine its performance when people are used to seeing looking after the NHS as a watchword for any leader who wishes to be elected and remain in power.
So what is the difference between devaluing and discounting society and talking it up – between no society and "big society"? So far it's difficult to see even a sliver of space between them, barring the direction of spin. Both seem to come with the same baggage. Why then should we expect the results of present policy with its talk of "big society" to be any different or any more successful than earlier talk of no society? This looks like a worrying case where history may be repeating itself, the first time as tragedy, the second time as even worse.
• Peter Beresford is professor of social policy at Brunel University
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