Tuesday 20 July 2010

Big Society comes to Sutton



David Cameron's plans for a "Big Society" will include our borough of Sutton - the only London borough (and one of only four councils) to be included. The idea appears to be that communities will be given greater powers to run their own facilities, such as post offices, libraries and transport services. Sutton itself will concentrate on sustainable transport services and youth projects and hope to be "champions of green living"... Funding will come in part from dormant bank accounts, although it has been pointed out that costs would be reduced if much of the work was now done by enthusiastic volunteers rather than council workers and civil servants. There have been concerns that this is a front to mask spending cuts. Ed Milliband has described it as a "cynical attempt" to "dignify its cuts agenda by dressing up the withdrawal of support with the language of reinvigorating civic society". What do you think about all this - do you think the borough is a suitable place for these plans - and what would you change first if you had the chance?

2 comments:

  1. oh joy! David Cameron is trialing his "big society" in Sutton - so we get to be the first borough to have things go wrong with the scheme - blatantly because we don't have a Tory MP!!

    while in theory the "big society" is not such a bad idea, and the sustainable transport and more facilities for youths is a good thing - but where are the funds coming from?? i thought there were cuts in the budget?! and if britain is really as "broken" as Cameron has said - who are these "enthusiastic volunteers" going to be??

    hopefully this isn't just an attepmt to justify spending cuts - although i am inclined to agree with Miniband...

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  2. The most telling thing about the 'big society' is that even high profile Tories like David David and Boris Johnson think it is vacuous nonsense.

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