Inside the Big Society Rescue Talks

• Commentary

• By Iain Martin

The wheels appear to be coming off the Big Society bus. The man hired to drive it, Lord Wei, has scaled back the time he can commit. He had been assured that his position would come with a salary but shortly after the election it was downgraded to an unpaid post. This had a negative impact on his family finances and he must now spend more time earning money elsewhere. Charities and volunteering organisations that have come to rely, often too heavily, on state contracts are upset that their money is being cut. Liverpool is pulling out of the initiative all together. How, the leader of the opposition asked David Cameron at PMQS on Wednesday, is the Big Society coming along?

Today Allegra Stratton in the Guardian has blown the lid off the Cameroon blame game that has started behind the scenes in Whitehall. Predictably and conveniently, the recently departed Andy Coulson is being blamed by former colleagues for not promoting the BS agenda with sufficient energy. This is, to put it mildly, a bit rich. In reality, it is extraordinary that Coulson bit his tongue as often as he did — when the Big Society was taking over the Tory manifesto and their election campaign. It then dominated Cameron’s speech to Tory party conference in the autumn, as he told Britons to get off their backsides, volunteer and go mend the leaky roof in the local youth centre. Two points: First, many people already do a lot; this stuff happened long before the Cameroons claim to have discovered it. Second, as Mrs. Martin pointed out while watching clips of Cameron’s conference speech on that night’s 10 o’clock news: “That’s easy for him to say” but the millions of his fellow Britons who work long hours for not much money and come home to little more than a pile of ironing are already pretty busy.

Coulson recognized that Cameron and Steve Hilton have what seems to be an unbreakable bond, and also that the Big Society really is the PM’s thing. So the communications chief generally seems to have restricted himself to asking for the Big Society bunch to explain what they were going on about more clearly than they have to date.

With Coulson gone a rescue bid is under way. Those around the PM are trying to put the wheels back on the Big Society bus. The key forum in this regard is the weekly Big Society meeting hosted by Francis Maude in the cabinet office,  attended by the Big Societyists and assorted government special advisers.

By a stroke of good luck I have been leaked a transcript of next week’s meeting.

Francis Maude: “Morning, morning. First, a warm welcome to Craig (Oliver), the Prime Minister’s new communications chief, who joins us from a very senior position at the BBC. It is very exciting that we are, at last, going to have someone in that job who is fully behind the Prime Minister’s Big Society agenda. And I understand, Craig, that you and the PM have agreed that promoting the Big Society is going to be your top priority?”

Craig Oliver: “Thanks Francis. We’ve agreed that dealing with the Big Society is going to be one of my priorities, that is the position.”

Maude: “Excellent, excellent. Now, who has the minutes of last week’s Big Society meeting? Someone volunteered to take the minutes last week and then produce them for this meeting.”

(There is a prolonged silence. No one responds.)

Oliver Letwin (Cameron’s policy guru, known to friends as Olive): “Francis is absolutely right. We have discussed this at length on previous occasions. It is imperative that we record an accurate account of these meetings and lay out the points of action so that we have a measure of accountability. That way all those who agreed, or volunteered, to undertake tasks can report back to the next meeting on progress made or not made. And we agreed that the task should be shared amongst the members of this group, so that everyone here gets experience of volunteering.”

Rohan Silva (leading Big Societyist, adviser to Cameron and aide to Steve Hilton): “But Olive do we actually need an old-fashioned minute of these meetings? Couldn’t we look at an open source solution instead? With everyone here expressing their views on Twitter during the meeting? That way we get a free flow of information and afterwards we can then have a thought cloud made up of all the tweets as an electronic archival record and guide for our deliberations at the next meeting?

Letwin: “That is certainly an interesting idea. But I do think Francis is right. If we are to make any progress it is essential that we know what we all agreed to at the previous meeting, in order that we can check later whether anything substantial, or indeed anything at all, has been done about it.”

Steve Hilton (wearing shorts, no socks, a cycling helmet and t-shirt emblazoned with a large slogan declaring “Love me, love my bike”):  “Look, just leave it with the whole minutes thing. We don’t need minutes and constraints and old ways of thinking. We need action, social action. And we need it now.”

Maude (sighing): “Let’s move on from the minutes, perhaps you could make a few notes this week Olive?”

Letwin (nodding and smiling): “Very good Francis, I will make some notes, although as you know I cannot vouch for the quality of my hand- writing…”

Maude: “Just do your best Olive, thank you. Now, first on the agenda this week is an update and full progress report from Lord Wei…”

(There is another embarrassed silence.)

James O’Shaughnessy (policy adviser):  “Francis, I’m afraid Lord Wei’s not here. He couldn’t make it.”

Maude (closing his eyes and sighing): “Why couldn’t he make it?”

O’Shaughnessy: “He said he doesn’t have the time. He’s very busy at work. But he’s sent a statement that he asked me to read out. Shall I?”

(Both Maude, wearily, and Letwin, intently, nod.)

O’Shaughnessy: “Ok, here goes. Lord Wei says: ‘What can you do for Big Society? If Big Society is to be more than a vague concept in the laboratory of political, social and economic experiments, we all have to consider what we can do to make it a reality. As the Prime Minister has said, it will not be easy. The road ahead will be long, the road will be winding. It will be a long and winding road. But commitment to Big Society should not be measured by time volunteered or the number of hours worked on it. Big Society is more a state of mind than something quantifiable, and…’.”

Maude: “Thank you James. I think we’ve heard enough.”

Hilton: “This is just time-wasting, we need to get on and build Dave’s Big Society. Come on!”

Letwin: “Yes indeed we do, and we all share your enthusiasm for the Prime Minister’s great project. But we are attempting, arguably slightly later than is ideal, to deal with the practicalities that we had been assured by you would be handled by Lord Wei. If we are to build the Big Society it will need firm foundations, then robustly built walls and finally a strong roof. If we do not take care there is a danger that rather than building the Big Society we will be left with little more than a giant hole in the ground. And we don’t want that, do we?”

Maude: “Thank you Olive, very well put. If I can continue with your house-building metaphor, once the Big Society is fully constructed, how should we market it and sell it?”

O’Shaughnessy: “Would new curtains help?”

Maude (losing his patience): “James, if you can’t say anything constructive then please say nothing. Craig, help us out here. You’re the communications expert. We’ve not done brilliantly so far when it comes to selling the Big Society. What do you suggest?”

Craig Oliver:  “Francis, this is all very, very interesting and extremely useful for me to hear.  And please remember that I’m just a new arrival trying to find his feet. I’m keen, going forward, that you should all regard my office door as always being open. If there are any ideas or concerns you have on the communications front then I’m all ears. I’m going to need the help of each and every one of you.  So bear with me whilst I adjust. But look, I’ve been thinking listening to you all talk about the Big Society, and talking to the Prime Minister one to one as he and I will be doing a lot every day. And it’s clear to me that this is a project that is central to what the Prime Minister and all of you want to achieve. But it strikes me, and I’m new, so don’t shoot me, that we might be making a mistake in the way we present it…”

Hilton: “Exactly. You mean that we should put the Big Society right out front on centre stage at the heart of absolutely everything we do?”

Craig Oliver: “Well, sort of, but in a counterintuitive way. One of the lessons I bring from television, just something to consider, just putting it out there, is the notion that you can easily over-expose an idea and in the process do it damage. Nowadays people suffer information overload. They might warm more to the Big Society if they hear less about it. Or even if they were to hear absolutely nothing about it.”

Letwin: “Interesting, very interesting. This proposal is clearly at the cutting edge of theorising on modern communications. You think we might get more attention for the Big Society if we kept it a secret?
And didn’t talk about it?”

Craig Oliver: “Just putting the thought out there. Less can be more.”

Steve Hilton (heading for the door that connects the cabinet office to Number 10, taking off his cycling helmet and throwing it against the wall, hitting a large portrait of Sir Robert Peel): “That’s it. I’m telling the Prime Minister. I’m calling Dave.”