Sharing in success: advancing a cooperative society
Michael Giles, Journalist and Communications Adviser
Mike is a journalist and communications adviser. He currently works as a broadcast journalist for an international television news channel. Previously Mike worked for the LGA as a communications adviser, specialising in media relations, and has also worked as Parliamentary Assistant for a MP in the House of Commons. He is the editor of ' One Nation, One World '.
www. mikemg. co. uk Twitter- @ mgonthemike
Cooperatives and mutuals are becoming widely recognised as being a force for good – with their impact extending from housing to community shops to football clubs. They are becoming known for their environmentalism, for providing consumers with power, for producing staff with higher levels of happiness, and for delivering high quality goods and services.
Cooperative politics
The Tory-led government promised last January to introduce a Cooperatives Bill in the 2012 Queens Speech, yet a bill never materialised. It ' s likely that by the end of this Parliament, the Coalition ' s only contribution to a cooperative agenda will have been the conversion of public services from being state run to being cooperative led. While this isn’ t necessarily a bad thing, it is an indication that the Coalition views cooperatives and mutuals as mechanisms to disengage the state from the provision of public services, rather than because they genuinely believe in the development of a cooperative economy and society.
' The Coalition views cooperatives and mutuals as mechanisms to disengage the state from the provision of public services '
On the other hand, Labour has a historic connection to the cooperative movement, with the Cooperative Party having been a sister organisation since 1927. In fact, there are 29 Co-operative Party MPs, with further representation in the Scottish Parliament, Welsh Assembly and in local government. The MPs range from Shadow Cabinet members like Ed Balls and Stephen Twigg, to members of the 2010 intake, such as Stella Creasy and Luciana Berger. This is a Parliamentary coalition that should be utilised to promote a new consensus on the companies where people work, the shops and services that people use and the places where people live.
Creating a genuinely cooperative society requires more than just a bill( as perhaps the Coalition
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