"We've Got the Power?"

TCC has posted a lot about the White Paper on Community Empowerment when it was still developing. We are pleased to that it is is now published and commits to:

• A local authority duty to promote democracy
• An extended duty to involve covering most crucially Police Authorities
• A £7.5 million Community Empowerment Fund
• £2 million in opportunities for people with disabilities to volunteer
• Extending mentoring and befriending
• A pathfinder "Take Part" programme on Citizenship education for adults
• £70 million "Community Builders" scheme to support independent multi-purpose organisations
• A duty on Council's to respond to petitions
• An extension in participatory budgeting to all local authorities
• Modest incentives for voting
• More Neighbourhood Councils
• Extensions of Neighbourhood Management by Council's and partners
• More "community justice" and pilot projects in "community payback" by young offenders
• The establishment of the Tenant Services Authority to strengthen the rights of tenants of affordable housing
• Direct access and shadowing by  young advisors of ministers and elected mayors
• A £6 million national institute of youth leadership
• Youth internships with Councillors
• Making it easier to have a directly elected Mayor
• More discretionary localised budgets for Councillors to act as a community leader on
• A new Asset Transfer Unit to help local communities act on the the Quirk Report
• A national framework for Community Land Trusts and 14 pilots

Whilst the debate on community empowerment will continue, the most important aspects at this stage of the process are:

• The additional monies that will be available. This is important in pump priming local activity. 
• The Asset Transfer process being strengthened. This area needs support to encourage demands to come from below, in order to realise the ideals of the Quirk Report. Any body should itself be made accountable to the bodies representing community groups such as the Development Trust Association and the recognition given to Community Land Trusts could also strengthen local communities.

Some organisations have expressed the concern that white paper is giving giving individuals rather than communities "control". However we at TCC think the proposals are actually the sort of approach that we have been advocating and acting upon for years. We recognises that to empower communities you need to empower individuals first. Community groups shouldn't feel threatened by this - they should feel genuinely empowered by it.

In saying the above we recognise this is an unfinished agenda. A lot is being proposed, but there is a lot more to consider. For example the need to make make Police Authorities and PCT's more accountable to the communities they cover is clearly now next on the agenda.

As a result rather than than just passively promoting the document, surely we should not just be talking to ourselves but instead organising a serious public information campaign by all engagement practitioners from across all the various sectors. We should not just leave it to the DCLG but collectively promote it. This would maximise its impact and its benefits to the public in the run up to it being approved as well as pushing public bodies to organise more pilots in advance of it.

The DCLG has produced postcards promoting the white papers key elements. Perhaps we should ensure they have a much wider distribution than usual?

Richard Wilson, the Director of Involve commented on need to treat community empowerment similar social networking software. In the same way that the web 2.0 makes many services as ubiquitous as electricity, we now need the scope for communities of interest, whether geographical or interest group, to be able to plug into democratic structures in the same way that one can plug into an online system. The fact that vast numbers are now mobilised by Facebook for social events shows the potential for involvement.

Finally we should add that the White Paper seemed to gain a reasonable degree of consensus from the main political parties. This should mean legislation happens quicker and there is a degree of stability to bed down some of the proposals.