Public opinion: Your blogs

Village greens threat is overblown

On 1 July, the national seminar on common land and town and village greens rejected the notion of a wholesale review of the laws for the registration of new greens.

As general secretary of the Open Spaces Society, I proposed the motion ‘This seminar believes that little change is needed to the current town and village greens regulations’. It was opposed by Cameron Watt of the National Housing Federation, and after debate, the majority of delegates voted for the motion.

Village green rules pander to the nimbys

I would have a small bet that when you think of a town or village green, a picture floats into your mind’s eye of manicured grass, a nearby pub, cricket being played, the thwack of leather on willow, gentle applause and the strike of a church clock.

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It’s up to us to liberate the NHS

Having read through Liberating the NHS, the coalition government’s new action plan for the NHS, I am left with confused and conflicting first thoughts.
The language is there; the role of the Department of Health we are told will be focused upon ‘improving public health, tackling health inequalities and reforming adult social care’. The headquarters of NHS meanwhile will not be in the department but in the ‘consulting room and the clinic’.

Give students vouchers, not cash

Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA) is a very heated topic of debate at this moment in time. There are mixed opinions about the scheme Labour introduced six years ago, with some arguing it’s now pointless and a waste of money and in the current economic climate it should be scrapped.

Can co-op offer Transition a more sustainable model?

The Transition Towns movement is well recognised, credible and attracting increasing amounts of interest. It is also recognised and cited as being very closed aligned to the co-operative movement, no doubt due to the shared values upon which both are based.

However, to date, Transition initiatives have rarely (if at all) structured or incorporated themselves as recognised co-operatives, and many people in the co-operative movement are starting to encourage them to do so. (here, here, and here)

Brokering for adequacy in austerity

A bit like redundancy, 'more for less' can look OK unless it's you that's in the firing line. There's little most of us as individuals can add to the current commentary about what's happening to the public sector, beyond hoping (a) that perhaps it won't be our own name next on the list, and (b) that somehow we'll cope.

Doing more for less

Doing more for less. Perhaps the most overused phrase in the current climate. Those of us who’ve been working for many years to make places better for people – through regeneration, community and economic development, social enterprise and neighbourhood renewal – have always had to do a lot with limited resources. We know the only certainty before the comprehensive spending review is that we’ll all have to do more with even less. But in many ways the phrase ‘doing more for less’ is the mantra that New Start and many of our readers have lived with for years.

The Big Society and the heritage sector

My local park brings back many happy childhood memories, but they were always tinged with a slight sadness because of the dilapidated Gothic building that overshadowed Saltwell Park.

Will the real Big Society please step forward

In a way you felt for them. Those, during the 2010 election campaign, who trotted out the line about the big new idea of Big Society and then braced themselves for the inevitable question... ‘Mmmm, so what exactly is Big Society?’

Often the question was followed by an awkward pause and then some mumbo-jumbo about disgruntled parents taking over schools. When that ran onto dodgy ground there was a grab for random words laden with nostalgia for a 1930s Britain which will never return... volunteers, community halls, whist drives and tea dances.

Big society, big new language

‘All these new words are very elitist, and I don’t think there’s a place for it. [By...] using language that a fair proportion of the community won’t understand you’ve already set yourselves apart before you’ve even started.’