Cameron goes Blond

chris as usual

At last ! Also recommended is the Demos pamphlet (www.demos.co.uk) 'Recapitalising the poor'.

We are in an incredible mess. Britain needs a reconstruction project. That is the challenge for Cameron & Co. They need to show leadership straight away - bite the bullet.

Chestcracker

The John Lewis way works because it operates in a competitive market, it has no unions and is a for profit (for the staff) organisation. Is this what Cameron is proposing for the NHS - I hope he is but he will not be allowed to do this while Lansley is SoS. I am beginning to detect a touch of the Emperor's New Clothes with the whole John Lewis thing.

Judy

Oh, maybe he just got the idea from "The Archers" where one of its more repulsive organic-environmentalist-greenies, Pat Archer, has proposed that the loss-making village shop should be turned into a community shop ....run by volunteers other than herself. Sounds very much like the sort of idea that Cameron would love.

This is going to be the Tories' version of the Meriden Collective. And it's exactly the sort of enterprise Ken Livingstone and the Loony Left councils of the 70s poured bucketloads of taxpayers' money into. Not one of those community enterprises has survived.

Just think of the nightmare administrative/financial apparatus that'd have to be set up to make it a reality. What if competing groups (like the friendly neighbourhood BNP Reading Group and the Jihad'R'Us Recruitment Society) take up the invitation?

This seems to be the sort of madcap stuff that gets foisted on a party with too many years in the wilderness and that's too eager to be seen to be sympathetic to rural and innercity urban romantic fantasists who can't cope with the 21st century public's penchant for supermarkets and online services like Amazon.

Naomi Muse

That is good stuff! Local communities making things work will turn the local economy too.

We've just set up 3 local enterprises where all can walk to work and work flexibly too.

We'll report back how they do.

The economy will only really come up again when the local economies start to produce tax revenues.

Chuck Unsworth

Right to Buy is excellent. One caveat, and that is who will then bear legal responsibility and for what.

Lots more work for the legal 'profession', though.

Olly boy

A fairly good idea although I work for a plc which owns numerous properties large and small throughout the UK. A fair few are empty and are eyesores. Although we intend to sell them, at the moment we can't get the price we want due to the current market so we're holding onto them. I don't think we'd be too keen on being forced to sell it to a local community for a "Fair Value".

Another question - what is their definition of a 'Fair Value'?

2trueblue

If you look back at what Thatcher did for 'regeneration' as opposed to what Labour did, the results were clear; if you involve locals with a stake then it works.

denis cooper

Following the link to Res Publica (the root of the word "republic") there's an interesting article in the Fabian Review:

http://www.respublica.org.uk/media/battle-tory-brain

"The battle for the Tory brain"

"Phillip Blond vs Tim Montgomerie"

"So the question arises: exactly who runs the Conservative Party?"

"Tim Montgomerie has the strength of numbers on his side: his ConservativeHome website has become a true blue hub for party members and parliamentary candidates, of whom an overwhelming majority are ideologically aligned with Montgomerie’s New Right revivalism.".

"Phillip Blond, on the other hand, has the ear of the shadow front bench, and David Cameron in particular, who have bent over backwards to endorse the ‘Progressive Conservatism’ project of which Blond has become the established guru."

I've speculated in the past whether Cameron could comfortably fit within the Fabian Society, or might even be a member.

Here's a link to an article about the Fabian Society stained glass window - "Note the wolf in sheep's clothing in the Fabian crest above the globe".

http://www.freedom-force.org/freedomcontent.cfm?fuseaction=fabianwindow&refpage=issues

"This is the stained-glass window from the Beatrice Webb House in Surrey, England, former headquarters of the Fabian Society. It was designed by George Bernard Shaw and depicts Sidney Webb and Shaw striking the Earth with hammers to "REMOULD IT NEARER TO THE HEART'S DESIRE," a line from Omar Khayyam. Note the wolf in sheep's clothing in the Fabian crest above the globe. The window is now on display at the London School of Economics (LSE), which was founded by Sydney and Beatrice Webb.

"The window was subsequently stolen from the house in 1978," says LSE's archivist, Sue Donnelly. "It surfaced in Phoenix, Arizona, soon after, but then disappeared again until it suddenly resurfaced at a sale at Sotheby's in July 2005." The window was purchased by the Webb Memorial Trust and now is on loan to the LSE where it is displayed in the schools Shaw Library. In April of 2006, the window was officially unvieled by a ceremony attended by British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who is a member of the Fabian Society."

Verity

Judy has it nailed.

DavidDP

"Tim Montgomerie has the strength of numbers on his side:"

No he doesn't. He has a blog with a decent level of readership. That's not the same thing as saying he has the majority of the party with him.

The man has a big enough head as it is. I do wish the media would stop trying to give him legitimacy as the voice of the grass roots when he is no such thing.

bernerlap

There is a problem with social enterprises and that is it takes people with social capital to run them. It is not true that all social enterprises - such as community shops fail. I live in an area where a couple of village shops have been taken over by local coops and they are thriving.
Both villages in question are extremely affluent, both have a high proportion of well off professional retirees who are helping to make the enterprises a success.
As a result everyone in the villages benefits.
But I wonder how effective such enterprises would be in a sink estate in Manchester or London.

David Lindsay

To the best of my knowledge, Phillip is the only person both to have the ear of David Cameron and to be a member of The David Lindsay Appreciation Society set up on Facebook by my tutees.

Local shop for local people

Actually V, it might work as seen in Wandsworth, where a local post office has been saved as a business by lobby of local market traders who needed to use banking facilities. If people get involved and the business is is viable, it will work. Cynics on yer bike.

David Lindsay

Quite so, LSFLP.

Shame on a party allegedly Fabian, Christian Socialist and co-operative in its roots, that it didn't do this years ago.

As for Phillip, PhD candidates yet unborn will devote enormous attention to the history of Radical Orthodoxy and its Diaspora.

Bob

Phillip deserves to have the ear of all three front benches: he is a true radical and is assembling a formidable team at ResPublica, perhaps the first of its kind in British political thinking (America has a few of this nature)

@chris: The Demos pamphlet was frankly awful, and only a lackey would suggest otherwise. That project/place is dead.

Frank P

Blond - the 'Red Tory' featured in Hard Talk some time ago. I drew CH-ers attention to it; it's worth watching it again:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00njkb5/HARDtalk_Phillip_Blond_Director_of_ResPublica/

The think tank culture will obviously remain with us if the Cameroons win the next election. Can anyone suggest how we can acquire a government run by elected politicians (answerable to the hoi polloi) with leaders chosen because of their experience, nous and proven track record? Backed up, of course, by career civil servants, operating on behalf of the country devoid of partisan politics, who likewise have Mandarins who have achieved their positions through ability and experience. Who will rid us of these quango shoo-ins, place men/women, think tanks and fixers who look like bookies runners or shyster's clerks? Basta!