Does George Osborne finally have a big idea?

Jonathan

I agree with you that it is a good idea. I think the success of John Lewis in the past few years has opened alot of people's eyes to the potential of co-ops or worker owned partnerships.

As a big free market fan I think they have an important role to play in the economy although their limitation in not always being able to raise as much capital as other company forms has to be recognised.

Oh and by the way, its a shame your visceral hatred of the Tories has kept you from listening to them because David Cameron was talking about co-ops in 2007 as seen in this BBC article

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7083878.stm

If you look closely you may even find the Tories have plenty of other big ideas that would make British society a far better place than Labour ever managed.

Matthew

If I recall correctly, Osbo did work in John Lewis, which I guess is kind of in the direction of a co-op.

PAUL GILBOY

It is a truly good idea; empowerment and responsibility are the twin keys to civic society, whilst Statism is a dead concept. A concept Mr Brown is wedded too.

I have been pondering the implications of this idea for some time now and, if theses proposals are argued discussed and implemented and are not hijacked by ideologues, the united kingdom could become a vibrant and exciting place to be.

Publius

"The idea of throwing open the public sector to worker-control is very, very intriguing."

-- The Tube, perhaps? Refuse collection? The motorways? Hospitals? How precisely will it work with any legal or natural monopoly?

Ian C

I have long advocated the creation of "Public Service Companies" or PSC's - as distinct from PLC's - for just this purpose.

Service companies require comparively little capital to start up - they need 'entrepreneurial capital' which comes in the form of the entrepreneur(s) taking personal risks with their career and immediate remuneration more than with large sums of money. But presently they hold the shareholder control in perpetuity thus restricting the ongoing service to their own comfort zone.

Once the financial risks have been repaid in the form of bigger salary than they previously earned and a stake in the company, under normal Limited Company structures it is very difficult for those who work for the enterprise to share in the financial rewards, the wider satisfaction arising and to influence the Services' development.

So this outline by Osborne is welcome and if nurtured successfully could provide a much more democratic means of wider service economy capitalism - not just Public service provision - which by definition need not be pure financial capitalism. At present you have to be exceptional to be a social entrpreneur. You should not need to be.

Thomas Haynes

Thanks for this article - very interesting! I've written an article about this policy over at Left Foot Forward. It can be found here: http://www.leftfootforward.org/2010/02/the-progressive-left-should-support-the-tory-co-op-policy/

Michael Aldred

Well, so long as this 'co-op' idea isn't fastened to the taxpayer's teat, that they can't simply screw up and not go out of business, then sure, go ahead. But remember this, "When everyone is responsible for something, no-one is."