Cutting through the BS

If the Big Society were a horse, it would be shot. The wounds are too deep, the contamination too great, its legs are broken. And, worse, the Big Society is giving a good idea a bad name. David Cameron tried manfully today, but we only ever hear about the BS (as most Tory MPs call it) when he’s trying to relaunch it. No agenda can be sustained with such thin support. It has become hopelessly confused as an issue. Myths have crept in that volunteering relies on heavy state spending, so Cameron is talking out of his hat. It ain’t so — Jonathan Jones did the digging — but people still believe it. Cameron gives multiple definitions of the BS, confusing the issue further. Does it mean families? Diversity of public service providers? More volunteering? Charitable donations? All of the above?

A large part of Cameron’s problem is timing. He’s asking people to volunteer more while his government is taking away more of our money by higher taxes, and — as Jeff Randal says in a brilliant Telegraph piece today — decimating our purchasing power by failing to control inflation. Right now, Cameron should be offering to do more stuff for the country. Not asking us all to do more. He rightly pays homage to civil society, recognising all the good done by non-state actors. But if he wants more of this philanthropy, he should cut taxes so people have more money to donate.

Cameron said today that this is what makes him tick, what gets him up in the morning. It says a lot about him, and in a good way. He has placed his faith not in the state but in the courage and character of the British people. He wants to make it easier for community groups, and sees in them an alternative for state provision of public services. He wants to replace the vertical ties, which bind individuals to the state, with horizontal ties that bind communities together. Lots of his policies are in this direction. There is a coherent thread running through this government, but the BS label makes it sound daft. Cameron and Hilton will believe that, by repetition, you can give a word meaning But I fear that it’s the wrong time in the economic cycle to talk about voluntary action: Cameron can too easily be accused of coming up with a cynical scheme to cover up the cuts. And he is getting no covering fire from his Cabinet, most of whom have grave reservations about the agenda and its presentation.

One Cabinet member told me that the BS agenda is proof that the government is run by people who spent too much of their life in political science lectures — and not enough in the real world, solving problems. I think that has a degree of truth. Blair used to worry that his government was coming apart due to lack of ideological glue, but fixed that with the reform agenda at home. Cameron should do the same. The Big Society is about empowerment: a far easier word, with purpose. Conservatives believe in taking power from the few, and passing it to the many. He has policies that do this: schools, welfare (to the extent that it encourages third-sector providers), elected police commissioners (when they come). But he needs to do more. Action first, theory after. The Big Society can work — but not as currently formulated. Times are too tough to listen to theories about society. Britain’s in the mood for a little less conversation.