David Lepper

Labour Party | Brighton Pavilion

The Co-operative Agenda and the Labour Government

The Co-operative Agenda and the Labour Government

Westminster Report

At the start of what is probably the last session of this Parliament it'stime to take stock of what our movement has gained from a Labourgovernment with 25 Co-operative Party MPs. – apart from a primeminister-initiated Commission into the future of the movement.

The co-operative movement's pioneering work on food safety, hygieneand labeling and on the consumer's rights to know about the food they eathas heavily influenced the setting up of the Food Standards Agency. Co-op MPs met with ministers on the detail of the legislation and promotedthe involvement of the Department of Health in the FSA It is clear fromthe Phillips Report on BSE that a Tory government would never havelegislated on these matters.

Following another lead given by the co-operative movement, part of thegovernment's response to the GM debate has been to widen therequirements on information about GM ingredients in products.

In the mid 1990s CWS published “Ending the Pain” about alternatives toanimal testing for many products. It has been a Labour government whichtook action on the voluntary agreement to ban animal testing forcosmetics and to widen representation on and the remit of the AnimalProcedures Committee – the watchdog on these issues.

Public disclosure regulations compel – for instance – the pension funds toreport on the social, environmental and ethical implications of theirinvestments, following the example of the Co-operative Bank.

Our Agenda for Labour prior to the 1997 general election stressed theimportance of the social economy of mutuals, building societies,voluntary organizations and co-operatives in the national economy – andin strategies for sustainable regeneration of our most deprived areas.

Tony Blair's introduction to the Social Exclusion Unit's report “BringingBritain Together: a national strategy for neighbourhood renewal” echoedthis stressing the importance of locally based solutions for addressingproblems of economic and social deprivation. And the report itselfhighlighted the importance of Local Exchange Trading Schemes andCredit Unions.

Co-operative Party MPs lobbied ministers and following, a favourablereport from the Treasury and the Social Exclusion Unit's Policy ActionTeam, the new Central Services Organization for Credit Unions is gettingunderway with the aim of doubling the numbers in credit unions to 1.4million by 2006.

The first phase of funding from the National Strategy for NeighbourhoodRenewal is now being distributed – my constituency benefits – adding tothe opportunities provided by the New Deal for Communities. Funding from that New Deal has helped set up one new Brighton based credit union.

Labour's Regional Development Agencies - which the Tories aim todisband - provide another framework which can support local mutualsand co-operatives - as the £3.5 m investment by Advantage WestMidlands (an RDA) in Dudley's Turner House – a base for 15 socialenterprises shows.

And we have recently had Chris Smith's announcement of the first directgovernment department funding for a mutual organization with thepledge of £750,000 over 3 years for Supporters Direct – promotingmutually owned football clubs.

In local government, Labour's modernizing local government and BestValue projects also offer huge opportunities for local authorities such asBrighton and Hove which has a high proportion of Labour/Co-operativecouncillors. In his pamphlet in the Co-op party's New Mutualism series –“New Mutualism – a new solution for renewed councils published earlierthis year Paul Gosling describes the Best Value requirement “to ensurethat public services are responsive to the needs of citizens, not theconvenience of service providers, are efficient and high quality and thatpolicy making is joined up and strategies, forward looking and notreactive to short-term pressures” and in service delivery to “recognizethe potential for others to contribute ideas and resources, and to participate in service delivery” as amounting to “what might be described as a manifesto for co-operation”.

All local authorities have to review their services by 2005 and MatthewWarburton, head of strategy at the Local Governmnet Association, said“…We would expect them to consider co-ops, community initiatives andother types of mutual enterprise.”

Of course, Greenwich Leisure has already shown how this can be donefor a major local authority service, even without the impetus of a Laboourgovernment providing the opportunities.

We still have to raise the profile of housing co-operatives, but theHousing Green paper gives scope for housing co-operatives in itsemphasis on new forms of tenant management. The Price Waterhouseinvestigation into tenant management gives us arguments here. “Thefindings of this research demonstrate that there are significant andWorthwhile benefits associated with tenant management organizations –especially those which give tenants effective control (tenantmanagement co-operatives) or autonomy (ownership co-operatives.

These take the form of not only the most cost –effective services,especially the speed and quality of repairs, but also in terms of widersocial and community benefits, such as through the acquisition of newskills and experience, which can be important to many residents in socialrented housing. The case study tenant management organizations have,in general, delivered higher levels of resident satisfaction across aWide range of housing services. While resources are required in theshort –term for setting up tenant management co-operatives, thebenefits arising from the initial investment can be expected to producelonger term, savings and benefits which more than outweigh the set-upcosts.”

The review of tenant management structures is important for another evenmore fundamental reason if we accept the view of Stephen Yeo, Chair ofthe Co-op College Board of management who argues that “the best wayto address the alienation from representative democracy is to do what co-operative and mutual enterprises always attempted, namely to builddemocracy and stakeholder accountability directly into all importantforms of purchase and provision.”

The changes the government is introducing in local government offerthese opportunities. Whether or not they are taken by councils is anothermatter.

Looking at the 1997 “Agenda for Labour” the checklist could go on –with the government's initiatives on international development and worlddebt, fair trade, childcare and nursery education and class sizes and some-but not enough – new protection for mutual building societies.

We do not have a Co-operatives Act – despite the tireless work of TedGraham – and that must be one priority for the second term.

But really we have come a long way in terms of social morality from theTory doctrine of “there is no such thing as society”.

As Bob Burlton said in his address to the 1999 Co-operative Congress inBrighton: “We find ourselves in a position where the world is open to co-operative and mutual solutions. This is a position, incidentally, that NewLabour has created….Woe betide us if we fail to seize the opportunity.”The more open policy making structures of the Labour Party now providethe opportunities to gain manifesto commitments for the second term.