Building a Stronger 
    Civil Society
    A strategy for voluntary and community  
    groups, charities and social enterprises 
     2  Building a Stronger Civil Society 
                                                                                       Building a Stronger Civil Society  3
               Introduction
               Together with citizens and                         3  Promoting social action: encouraging 
               communities, the voluntary and                       and enaling people from all walƒs of life  
               community sector sits at the heart                   to play a more active part in society, and 
                                                                    promoting more volunteering and  
               of the Government’s amitions                        philanthropy
               to create a Big Society                           These reforms will radically re†cast the  
                                                                  relationship etween the state and charities, 
               e recognise and value the special aility         social enterprises and voluntary and  
               of voluntary and community organisations           community groups over the coming years 
               to moilise and support people, particularly       They will give the sector a huge range of  
               those who sometimes struggle to find a voice  new opportunities to shape and provide  
               e want to harness their power to find etter      innovative, ottom†up services where  
               solutions to our social prolems ur vision is    e‚pensive state provision has failed  
               for the sector, as a resilient and independent     ­romoting social action will maƒe an  
               partner, to play an even more influential role     important contriution to creating the step 
               in shaping a stronger sense of society and         change in attitudes to giving oth time and 
               improving people’s lives                          money that will transform the aility of the 
               The reforms set out in the Coalition               sector to improve people’s lives ‰ew  
               Government’s ­rogramme for Government              opportunities will present themselves to  
               and the Spending €eview, which will e             worƒ together with the usiness community 
               pulished ne‚t weeƒ, represent a real              and philanthropists to maƒe a significant  
               opportunity for the voluntary and community        difference to local grass roots organisations 
               sector across the three core components of         Šowever, the Government recognises that 
               the Big Society policy agenda„                     these opportunities will not emerge overnight 
               …  Empowering communities: giving local           and that to taƒe advantage of them the sector 
                  councils and  neighourhoods more power  will need some support  e also recognise 
                  to taƒe decisions and shape their area         that the action that Government is taƒing to 
                                                                  reduce the deficit could mean a reduction in 
               2  Opening up public services: the                income for many civil society organisations 
                  Government’s pulic service reforms will        This will e particularly challenging for  
                  enale charities, social enterprises, private   organisations who have a high level of  
                  companies and employee†owned                    dependence on state income and low  
                  co†operatives to compete to offer               reserves 
                  people high ‡uality servicesˆ
         ‹  Building a Stronger Civil Society 
         The sector cannot e immune from                  The ffice for Civil Society is worƒing with 
         reductions in pulic e‚penditure ecause          strategic partners and the ’GA to facilitate 
         the scale of the challenge to reduce the          local events that will deate and share est 
         national deficit is so great €estoring           practice in relation to managing cuts e  
         confidence in the economy is in the interest      are developing the successful ­artnership  
         of the whole country, including the voluntary     “mprovement ­rogramme to support the 
         and community sector Šowever the                 creation of strong relationships etween  
         Government recognises that this is a              local pulic odies and the sector The  
         particularly challenging time for charitiesˆ      Compact is eing refreshed and renewed 
         social enterprises and other voluntary            with new measures to improve transparency 
         organisations Œemand for services has            and accountaility 
         risen through the recession and the funding  
         environment has got even harder Badly 
         handled pulic sector cuts could significantly 
         alter the aility of the sector to nurture social 
         capital and support some of the most  
         vulnerale people in society Žust at a time 
         when we want to uild that social capital  
         and encourage those local support networƒs
         So we are ƒeen to worƒ with the sector in 
         identifying the smartest way of maƒing  
         savings and finding etter ways of doing 
         things The ‘inister for the Cainet ffice 
         and ‘inister for Civil Society wrote an open 
         letter to the voluntary, community and social 
         enterprise sector this summer asƒing for their 
         view on how the Government can reduce the 
         deficit and deliver services more innovatively 
         and efficiently, and is taƒing forward these 
         responses as part of the Spending €eview