Cameron's Conservative Co-operative Movement

[MJR]

I work up with a start this morning, when the radio news announced Cameron's latest speech would advocate cooperatives running schools. Here's the full speech:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7084865.stm

I'm a bit worried by the inclusion in the speech of "not just stakeholders, but shareholders - not of a profit-making company but of a co-operative built around the needs of local children" because profit-making is independent of cooperative status. Indeed, most cooperatives could not give so much back to the community if they did not make a profit. Cameron also closes by wittering about social responsibility, which is often heard in "corporate social responsibility" - another name for "greenwashing" and "whitewashing".

Reaction around the web:

CAMERON TRIES TO HIJACK CO-OPERATIVE PARTY POLICIES http://party.coop/info_news.php?id=32

Cameron: parents should start co-op schools
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/publicse ... 63,00.html

Cameron promises Labour-style local 'co-operatives' to run public services
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/a ... ge_id=1770

Search for more recent news:
http://www.newsnow.co.uk/newsfeed/?sear ... tive+Party


So, are you going to join the Conservative Co-operative Movement? Why or why not? (Excuse me while I find the flameproof clothing...)

[joeturner]

Disclaimer: I've never voted conservative and am unlikely ever to vote conservative.

I've not read this in detail yet, but I disagree with your analysis MJR.

It does not strike me that Cameron is trying to hijack Co-op principles, nor that he is trying to make out that non-profit=co-operative.

I think he is trying to say that the management of a school should be a) co-operative and b) non-profit. A sentiment that I would entirely agree with. We do not need to create unaccountable quangos which run schools in every community, nor do we need to pay businessmen to make money from teaching our children in the state system.

I don't see how this is hijacking Co-op Party policies, given that the Co-op Party is a largely pathetic institution which serves only as a kind of pressure group within the Labour Party. Whoever thought of the idea of having MPs being members of two political parties need their heads examined and the rest of us need to ask which tune these politicians will dance to when the two masters come into conflict: hint, not the co-op one.

I don't remember seeing much Co-op Party angst regarding the City Academy programme (a bone-idle programme if ever there was one, which enables a local businessman to have total control over a school, despite only putting in 10% of the capital needed to run it, the rest generously given by the government. A sensible person might well ask how come the money is available for the businessman yet the 90% wasn't when the school was failing).

The nearest we have to Co-op Schools are a couple managed by the Co-op Group. I'd be interested to know how 'co-operative' these actually are.

[MJR]

I've not read this in detail yet, but I disagree with your analysis MJR.

It does not strike me that Cameron is trying to hijack Co-op principles, nor that he is trying to make out that non-profit=co-operative.

Just to be clear: the hijack line was from the co-op party news release's headline, not my analysis.

I am slightly worried about the profit-making V cooperative bit, but the social enterprise crowd worry me about that too...

[dan]

On the Social responsibility bit, there is a lot of work going on at the moment around social accounting.

The idea is to make this meaningful instead of the lip service often given by CSR.

[jockox3]

Actually I think he is trying to do something. I agree that co-operatives can fill a place in localizing and devolving big state enterprises as well as democratizing capitalist enterprises. And that co-operative schools, whilst hardly novel (Milton Friedman wrote about the idea forty odd years ago of course), would be better that government schools and particularly academiespart funded and fully controlled by the wealthy.

However Cameron's speeech went way further than that...essentially to the effect that co-operative pricniples had always really walked side-by-side with Tory principles. And I've had a go at that on my blog.

[Sam]

Hi there. Quick correction - to my knowledge, the Co-op Group does not manage any schools. There are a few specialist schools who are sponsored by the Co-op Group, but I don't think that the relationship goes past provision of some learning materials and ideas for the role of Co-operatives in business and citizenship lessons.

[Matt]

I don't remember seeing much Co-op Party angst regarding the City Academy programme (a bone-idle programme if ever there was one, which enables a local businessman to have total control over a school, despite only putting in 10% of the capital needed to run it, the rest generously given by the government. A sensible person might well ask how come the money is available for the businessman yet the 90% wasn't when the school was failing).

The nearest we have to Co-op Schools are a couple managed by the Co-op Group. I'd be interested to know how 'co-operative' these actually are.

If I remember correctly, the Co-op Party conference in September passed a motion against Academies, overturning the NEC recommendation.

As for Cameron, I am very suspicious that his model of co-operation could be a trojan horse for privatisation and cuts to public services. I don't know of any local authority controlled by the Conservatives that has a good record on co-ops.

[joeturner]

More information about the co-op sponsored schools here

[Adam York]

Can someone from the Co-op Party please post anything suggestive of a social values residue?

Having a Co-op Party great idea by co-op pioneers.As with all representative bodies tricky to keep anchored to a constituency and some accountability, but has had it's moments.Unfortunately not in the last 20 years,seemingly silent for much of the Thatcher years and complicit for much of neo-Labour's reign.Anybody still proud of that Hazel Blears' speech at Co-op Congress?

While Dave speaking on Co-ops is bemusing, to further salt the wound his analysis of Manchester was largely correct.ie Laissez-fairist Labour regime leaving half the population behind with the inevitable social fallout.Obsession with big box retailers and a shiny city centre and the sort of nieve trickle down economics thinking abandoned in the 1970s.Manchester a city in many ways a microsm of much of the national economic "miracle",now looks particularly ill-prepared now the bubble has burst. Crap secondaries,empty post speculator flats and Tesco/Sustainable Aviation Universities are not tools to survive in a world with real energy costs and a surplus of hungry people.

When somebody from the (maybe) right has to point this out then you suspect Milton and Rupert were the authors all along. Co-op schools V Academies and deranged targets,they couldn't be any worse.Comprehensive secondaries (of non-monster size)work fine as long as they are properly staffed (you know just like private schools' pupil teacher ratios).
Regards to all from the home of free traders and the Co-op Movement(aside from lots of it wanting to sell up!)
Adam York

[ChrisCook]

I don't see why the Cooperative movement should identify themselves exclusively with Labour, and particularly not New Labour.

And I say this based upon a solid Labour family background going back generations (albeit I resigned my membership a few years ago once I saw the way things were going).

One thing Cameron said that I agree with totally was "... there is such a thing as Society, but it's not the State...".

When we say "Private" we mean "owned by a (For Profit) "Joint Stock Limited Liability Company" .

But there are other ways of doing it, as we know.

In that space which, up here in Scotland, is the "Not Proven" zone between "Guilty" and "Not Guilty"

I have been pointing out for several years now that the "new" UK Limited Liability Partnership" ("LLP") essentially makes most other existing corporate forms pretty much obsolete. Including genetically modified forms of "the Corporation" such as IPS's and CIC's.

I believe that there is an optimal enterprise model, and that it consists of a "Cooperative of Cooperatives" or "Partnership of Partnerships".

ie a partnership between "stakeholder consortia". Imagine a worker coop in partnership with a retail coop within a simple framework.

Moreover, using an LLP it is now possible to form revenue sharing "Capital Partnerships" where public assets are kept in trust and a reasonable return is paid to "Capital Partner" investors by the "Capital Users".

ie it is not necessary for the Public sector to borrow to invest in (say) a new school, when local parents (and their children's trust funds) may invest in a new form of "quasi -Equity" unit (a proportional share or "n'th") in a pool of property rentals.

So why should a school not comprise a cooperative of teachers and other staff as an "Operating Member" of a "Community Education Partnership" in which a cooperative of parents etc are the "Community Member" and the school itself is held by a "Custodian" probably a Company Limited by Guarantee of the CIC variety (for the asset lock)?

Such an LLP would not be an "Organisation" like conventional Coops etc but a framework within which the stakeholders may "self-organise".

Unfortunately, most professionals advising the Cooperative movement (and a surprising number within it) have no interest in the simple consensual solutions enabled by LLP's because they are paid by the hour, not the outcome.

[MJR]

I agree about Labour exclusivity being a bad thing - the (now-removed?) link to the Co-op Party was one of the things that deterred me from undertaking the Cooperatives UK membership application marathon until recently.

I don't think many cooperative development professionals are ignoring LLPs because of any self-interest. I think they're ignoring them because there are still significant problems in working as an LLP and it's too early to say whether it's a good model... for example, banking services are still really crap at dealing with us. I'm pretty sure that even the Co-operative Bank business account application forms don't include LLP as an option, but I didn't even find details about any business accounts on their web site just now. Our company "number" contains letters, which also screws various systems. I feel that the government should have required LLPs to be accepted anywhere Ltds are, but I don't know whether that would have stuck. Surely it should have been possible at least in regulated industries like banking?

I think Cooperatives UK's forms also excluded LLPs and their advice claimed various problems with LLP co-ops in the past, but that all seems to be fixed now. They reported that they knew of only 3 LLP co-ops as of early October 2007, though. I share your enthusiasm for registered cooperative partnerships, but it still seems to be early days.

Then again, many cooperative development pros seem to be enthusiastic early adopters of CICs (which worries me anyway) so why one rule for LLPs and another for CICs?

[ChrisCook]

LLP's have been around for 6.5 years now, CIC's for less than two (I think).

The number of LLP's has doubled in the last two years to more than 15,000, but virtually no-one has any idea what people are doing with them.

I am aware of maybe a dozen which could be characterised as "Cooperatives" albeit not formal Coops.

Indeed, the model is inherently Cooperative. I submitted this ( alittle outdated, but still valid)

http://www.opencapital.net/papers/coope ... talism.htm

paper to the Journal of Cooperative Studies about four years ago but, strangely enough, it never made it past a (lawyer) referee.

Unfortunately there is a good living to be made from conflicted and complex solutions, and, as they say, turkeys don't vote for Christmas.

Don't expect anything other than reasons not to use LLP's from people who make a nice living out of the existing system.

That is unfortunate because these emerging Cooperative financial solutions "out-compete" conventional financial structures (which is why canny operators are using them) that rely upon returns to pure "rentiers" as opposed to "stakeholders".

ie they make use of the "Co-operative Advantage".

It really disappoints me (it doesn't surprise me, though) to see the Cooperative movement failing to achieve its potential because of what is essentially Luddism.

[adrian.ashton]

there's a worker co-op in London (2amase, I think) who adopted the LLP model last year, but I understand have struggled to date with it due to the lack of understanding of this model by most professional bodies that you have to engage with (banks, accountants, etc).

Perhaps its something to do with the relative age of this model in comparison with others?
Company forms have been around for a while now, but only in recent years (relatively speaking) is it that co-ops have begun to adopt them (70's onwards), so should we be surprised when these new models don't get the uptake or profile we expect or hope? And what more can the wider movement be doing to address this??

and am I in danger of going off-topic here???

[ChrisCook]

This probably merits a topic of its own, Adrian, yes.

But you only have to look at the Cooperative Futures website to see the problem

http://www.co-operativefutures.coop/doc ... ptions.pdf

Spot the deliberate omission?

I know 2amase pretty well, and I think Gabrielle got the idea of using an LLP from hearing me talk about it.

But while replicating conventional business structures using LLP's is possible, it rather misses the point, and businesses will go "pear-shaped" in exactly the same way as any other business if they do that.

What I have been working on is the use of LLP's for "Capital Partnerships" between users and providers of finance (and finance need not just be in money terms).

eg "The Art of Flirting LLP" was set up to make a film of that name: the actors, the producer and me (5%) all got "Equity Shares" in the revenue (if there is any). We needed £10k to pay for lights, camera's, pizza etc and we recruited two "Angel" "Capital Partners" who received 20% of the revenues (if there are any) in return for their investment.

The film hasn't yet made a penny, and so far we have all lost our investment in time or money, but at least the money investors were able to offset their loss against other taxable income.

This is an example of probably the purest Cooperative ever created, and plenty more where that came from.

[MJR]

But you only have to look at the Cooperative Futures website to see the problem

http://www.co-operativefutures.coop/doc ... ptions.pdf

Spot the deliberate omission?

Whee... and their L9LegalStatusIncorporation-Constitutions.pdf lists LLP under "Unincorporated" which directly contradicts http://www.companies-house.gov.uk/about ... llp1.shtml so I think I'll drop one of their board an email asking why they're saying such strange things.

Would the readers of this thread be interested in forming an LLP cooperatives group?