The real problem with the Big Society (and I speak as someone who has written in favour of the idea) is that it was a vaguely-defined description that was turned into a vaguely-defined aspiration. As with so much of the Conservative Party’s agenda it turned out the project was infused with a nostalgic right-wing utopianism.
Yesterday’s letter to The Times from Sir Stephen Budd, the CEO of the Association of Chief Executives of Charitable Organisations (Acevo) was an important intervention from the third sector, which feels justifiably angry that it was marched up to the top of the hill by Iain Duncan Smith and then marched all the way back down again. To be fair to the Grand Old Duke of Chingford, it always seemed that the Big Society was something of a bolt-on to his welfare reforms. His employment minister, Mark Hoban, has been putting in the hours meeting representatives of the third sector.
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