insight 07: sustainable sector - changes and challenges

AUSTRALIAN COUNCIL OF SOCIAL SERVICEVICTORIAN COUNCIL OF SOCIAL SERVICE ISSUE 7

SUSTAINABLE

SECTOR

CHANGES AND

CHALLENGES

CONTENTS CONTRIBUTORSINSIGHT

SUSTAINABLE SECTOR: CHANGES AND CHALLENGES

04. 2022 – THE FUTURE IS HERE Cath Smith

08. SECTOR REFORM: UNFINISHED BUSINESS Tessa Boyd-Caine

010. IN CONVERSATION Mark Butler, Minister for Mental Health and Ageing, and Social Inclusion

014. POLITICS, POLICIES AND CHANGING TIMES Naomi Eisenstadt

016. DEMANDING A JUST TRANSITION Julia Unwin

021. BIG SOCIETY: TOO BIG A PRICE TO PAY? James Whelan

025. VOX POP

028. RISK-READY: IT’S TIME FOR INNOVATION

Peter Shergold

032. WORKFORCE: WHAT’S THE STRATEGY? Wallis Westbrook

034. HOW ‘PLACE’ FARES IN PLACE-BASED SOLUTIONS David Tennant

036. FUNDING MODELS: A REALISTIC ROAD AHEAD Myles McGregor-Lowndes, Amanda McBratney

040. WORKING TOGETHER Trevor Carlyon

043. COMPARING COSTS THROUGH COLLABORATION

Micaela Cronin

045. SENSE OF STRUGGLE, NEED FOR HOPE

John Falzon

Publisher: Penny WilsonPolicy editor: Llewellyn ReyndersEditor: Marie McInerneyDesign: Nicole DominicPrinter: Blueprint

Insight is printed on recycled paper, using vegetable-based inks, by an ISO 1400-accredited printer.

Acknowledgements Special thanks to: all our contributors; our advertisers HESTA, National Housing Conference (Brisbane 2012), Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI), Monash University, and Queensland University of Technology.

This edition of Insight is a special national publication of the Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) and the Victorian Council of Social Service (VCOSS).

Articles are subject to copyright. Apart from dealings under the Copyright Act 1968, permission must be obtained from both VCOSS and the author.

VICTORIAN COUNCIL OF SOCIAL SERVICE

Level 8, 128 Exhibition Street Melbourne 3000

03 9654 5050

VCOSS raises awareness of the existence, causes and effects of poverty and inequality, and contributes to initiatives seeking to create a more just society.

www.vcoss.org.au

Join the Twitter conversation at @vcoss

Accessible format If you would like to receive this publication in an accessible format, please telephone 03 9654 5050 or email [email protected]

Dr Tessa Boyd-Caine is Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS)

Trevor Carlyon is a Queensland-based consultant and author of Working Together: A Green Paper

Micaela Cronin is Chief Executive Officer of MacKillop Family Services and President of the Victorian Council of Social Service (VCOSS) Board

Naomi Eisenstadt is the former Director of the UK Social Exclusion Task Force and now a Senior Research Fellow at Oxford University

Dr John Falzon is Chief Executive of the St Vincent de Paul Society National Council and a member of the Australian Social Inclusion Board

Dr Amanda McBratney is Senior Lecturer in the School of Accountancy at the Queensland University of Technology

Professor Myles McGregor-Lowndes is Director of the Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Non-profit Studies at the Queensland University of Technology

Professor Peter Shergold is the Chancellor of the University of Western Sydney and former Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet

Cath Smith is former Chief Executive Officer of the Victorian Council of Social Service (VCOSS) and now Director of Social Performance with Futureye

David Tennant is Chief Executive Officer of Goulburn Valley Family Care Inc in Shepparton, Victoria

Julia Unwin is Chief Executive of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation in the UK

Wallis Westbrook is Executive Director of the Health and Community Services Workforce Council in Queensland

Dr James Whelan is a Fellow of the Centre for Policy Development

ISSN 1838 5184ISBN 978-0-949748-84-3

The community sector in Australia plays a vital role in providing services that support people to get their lives back on track and to protect many from further harm. In doing so, it makes a valuable contribution to the Australian economy and more broadly as an industry.

Currently the sector is experiencing significant reforms across a range of areas, from new funding models such as the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) through to the arrival of a new national regulator, plus pay equity and ongoing changes to the tax treatment of the sector, definition of charity, funding, quality standards and reporting requirements.

Beyond these, a host of other changes – structural, political and social – could radically change the sector’s role, composition and identity over the coming decades. They include: a tighter economic environment, steps to measure outcomes rather than outputs, individualised funding, growing complexity in people’s lives, an ageing community, population growth in some areas and decline in others, changing patterns of voluntarism, increasing numbers of emergency events, and more.

In that environment, how are sector organisations to respond in ways that improve outcomes for those needing services? Some of those responses will be within the sector’s purview, including better ways to work not just with government but with each other; others will only be things that government can do, such as funding mechanisms and arrangements. Both need to identify how each can improve their respective systems and approaches, and where new solutions may lie.

Both may also have to rethink how they see each other and themselves. Too often, community services have been viewed by governments as high-cost, deficit-filling expenditures with uncertain social impacts. With revenues under pressure and a host of other demands for public spending, it can be much too easy for governments to fall back on the position that they can’t afford basic social care and infrastructure. Community sector organisations need to challenge the evidence base for these assumptions.

But doing so will not automatically mean more funding. The sector also needs to be honest about what works and what doesn’t, and from where change must begin. When the sector points to how early intervention and

integrated approaches effectively address issues of vulnerability and disadvantage, it should also consider how these principles apply to its own work and organisational culture, and the way that organisations work together. As a sector we need to acknowledge that change is constant, yet disadvantage remains entrenched in too many areas of the communities organisations work with.

This edition of Insight considers the future of the sector in that light: what is needed – internally and externally – to constantly strengthen and enhance the work of organisations to help improve the lives of vulnerable individuals and communities.

Our contributors – all leading thinkers and practitioners – look at how the sector can further develop capacity and capability, work more collaboratively, test new approaches, shape new models in funding and service delivery, effectively manage workplace demands – and think about what sector organisations are for. With the United Kingdom providing a glimpse into one possible future for Australia, this edition includes a focus on the impacts and implications of the UK’s ‘Big Society’ reforms.

The Honourable Mark Butler, Minister for Mental Health and Ageing, Social Inclusion, and Assisting the Prime Minister on Mental Health Reform also provides welcome insights to the Federal Government’s social policy agenda.

ACOSS and VCOSS are again pleased to publish Insight as a national collaboration with the support of the network of Councils of Social Service across Australia.

This edition is by no means the final word, but an opportunity to discuss the future. The conversations will, of course, continue across the sector, including at the ACOSS conference in Adelaide in March 2013 and at VCOSS’s biennial Congress in August 2013.

In the meantime, we hope you find much to read in Insight. Let us know what you think.

Cassandra Goldie, CEO, ACOSS

Penny Wilson, CEO, VCOSS

Carolyn Atkins, Deputy Director, VCOSS

September 2012

EDITORIAL.

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INSIGHT 703. EDITORIAL

The issue of sector sustainability has been on the agenda for some time. Former VCOSS CEO Cath Smith looks back on a decade of looking forward and finds the seeds of an exciting, if challenging, future.

When I started at the Victorian Council of Social Service (VCOSS) in 2002, I was given a box of files from a project called ‘Community Agencies Together‘ which reflected the survival thinking of small organisations in the 1990s. The context was clear: small organisations were not seen as ‘efficient’ or ‘accountable’, despite their low cost structures and strong community involvement.

However, the 2002 VCOSS Congress included a presentation from Lesley Hoatson, then at Victoria University, reviewing her research into community development capability in the community sector over the 1990s. The key message was that community development as a professional capability and element of mission had been eroded by cuts during the Kennett Government years, but had survived where there were factors such as ‘bloody mindedness’ and long service by key leaders. I would argue that the early 2000s saw numerous government initiatives that actively required community development skills and where success was constrained where they were lacking.

Concurrently, members, union officials and government personnel told me stories of excessive unpaid overtime, workers under stress, and organisations flying close to the financial wind. I wondered privately: is the community sector viable in a modern context?

During the 2000s I observed serious attention to viability by many individual organisations and some valiant attempts to consider it as sectors or networks together.

VCOSS set up a cross-sectoral Community Sector Sustainability task group, though in 2006 the then Minister for Community Services suggested we shouldn’t use words such as ‘sustainability’ as it ‘sounds like your nostrils are about to go under the water’. So we renamed it the Community Sector Futures Task Group, which commissioned a series of useful papers on future scenarios including one outlining all major scenarios and issues by Professor Jo Barraket.2.

The Swinburne Foresight Institute, as it then was, helped facilitate a ‘preferred futures’ workshop over three days in early 2007, with 30 diverse representatives from large and small organisations. Provocations were debated, and the result was a positive vision and some 10-20 year actions, reflecting the role of community sector organisations being an integral part of a ‘good society’ with a focus on mission and values, rather than size.

The process was complicated by it deliberately involving numerous sectors and covering a wide array of geographically dispersed work, which made it virtually impossible to deliver an action plan that was ‘actionable’. However it built a strong network between the participants which subsequently withstood significant change.

Still we face key challenges ahead. They include:

1. Keeping vision alive in a tough environmentWhile the collaborative foresight exercise illustrated that organisations of civil society (such as community sector organisations) are the natural home of visionary processes, a key challenge is to maintain and act on this in an under-resourced and highly competitive environment.

Applying small business planning approaches to community sector organisations is useful but fraught with difficulty when the main ‘customer’ is one or more government departments, rather than the participants or clients who most value the organisation’s work. In a planning process where an organisation is trying to clarify whether and how to grow, the government policy and funding context can become overwhelming.

Using external support is often necessary. There are numerous sources of pro bono and cost effective support out there; the trick is to recognise what is needed, be very clear as to your brief, work this through, and stick with the outcomes. Bringing conflicting visions for the organisation into the open and addressing future viability threats are the only way of averting these from becoming ‘fulfilled prophecies’.

2022?

1. Jo Barraket, Shaping the future of the Victorian community sector: scenarios and issues for consideration, July 2007, available at bit.ly/Ou4HM3

04. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR CATH SMITH

The future is here2. Building desire within government and business to support and develop a strong community sector As a peak body CEO, I heard a variety of views of the sector from government officials and advisors. advisers, including these examples:

‘Small organisations are not viable in today’s funding and upwards accountability environment; we need governments to contract with lead agencies to sub-contract work to those flexible enough to deliver community accountability’.

‘Contracting out to the welfare sector is a problem as they are so inefficient – the money is funding too many back offices.’

These questions of efficiency and accountability were considered by the VCOSS Community Sector Futures Task Group. Its 2008 strategic plan posed some obvious questions around accountability: to whom? and does efficiency mean high overheads with consistent high volume transactions, as per government models of service delivery, or does it mean low overheads with highly qualititative deliverables, with long lead times, multiple actors and numerous non-material factors driving success?

VCOSS, together with Victorian sector peak bodies and member service providers, worked hard to influence the former Labor Government on funding and contracting policy, and price indexation and program pricing became major issues. At the national level, the Productivity Commission’s report on the not-for-profit sector2 made key structural recommendations, which included the need for full-cost funding and proper contracting arrangements.

While contracting policy is still at an embryonic stage in Australia, the Fair Work Australia determination on social and community service pay rates has been a much-awaited symbol of commitment by wider society that the work of the sector is valued and should be paid closer to the levels of government workers.

There is now an opportunity to work with state governments and both sides of politics in the lead up to the next federal election to clarify the value and

contribution of the sector, to demonstrate the wider social and economic risks of this being eroded, and to demonstrate leadership for a preferred future.

What this requires is for the sector to demonstrate that it is ‘up for it’ and to work collaboratively together, not across each other.

3. Sharing vision and action across and beyond the sector‘Sorry I can’t get to the planning day, we have too many urgent internal issues to attend to.’

‘What’s the point of partnership? It wastes time and money and ties us up in committees.’

Developing a shared vision and action plan that can be implemented across multiple organisations and networks, and involve other sectors such as government or the private sector, undoubtedly takes time, with significant cost to management brain space.

However if there is a true accountability to deliver a social and economic outcome from the work, no one organisation or department can be big enough to deliver major change alone. The capabilities to work effectively within, manage, govern, plan and exit multi-party partnerships require significant investment by sector funders and educational providers.

4. Building a positive culture that ‘walks the talk’One recently appointed senior sector executive told me, ‘I am the first female CEO under the age of 40. When I started, a senior member asked if I was the CEO’s secretary.’

Another leader told me, ‘Our workers don’t want portable long service leave, they would prefer a pay rise’, despite their organisation deciding not to pass on the 3 per cent funding indexation into wages.

If we don’t want the future to be just like the past at the wider societal level, a key challenge for us is what are we going to do differently in our organisations, as part of a value-based sector, to help bring that about?

2. Productivity Commission, Contribution of the Not-for-Profit Sector: Research Report, Productivity Commission, Melbourne, 2010, chapter 12, pp 297ff.

05. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR

Likewise, if sector leaders (including long term staff who ‘carry the culture’, as well as senior managers, CEOs, board members and active members) focus solely on maintaining ‘business as usual’ we probably won’t be around to do business in ten years.

Crystal ball 2022?The drivers on our sector for the next decade are many and various. Here are a few ideas based on current trends of how the future may look, with a little attention and persuasion, and how some of the riskier trends may be tempered by good policy:

•Service provision: there will be fewer state government-funded service providers – due to mergers; closures because management committees were unable (lack of time, money, desire) to find a new generation of leaders; and government outsourcing to fewer, larger NGOs with ‘government-like’ accountability models, who sub-contract to smaller organisations best-placed to deliver specific services or within specific communities. (Note: A system-wide risk analysis would have occurred beforehand to ensure disadvantaged citizens are not exposed to greater risk than currently, and full cost funding will have been implemented to allow these providers to manage complex accountability and service requirements, with high levels of public scrutiny.)

•Enterprising organisations: more ‘hybrid’ organisations will have developed an area of enterprise as well as service. This will include niche activity in social care, health, employment, social connection, environment, and waste management and energy efficiency.

•Consumer activism: new generation ‘consumer’ organisations will have been strengthened by the ‘Occupy’ global model: highly digitally enabled, loose activist networks, which do not accept service delivery that breaches their human rights,

whether delivered by government or NGO service suppliers, and which expect higher levels of public accountability and transparent ‘monitor-ability’.

•Specialisation: with the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) having been fully working for five years by 2022, there will be an emerging sector of quality and price ‘brokers’ between disadvantaged members of the community and the main service providers. This will encourage service providers to undertake certain activities at an exceptional level, as ‘niche’ or specialist providers, and other suppliers to be ‘full service providers’.

•Service reform: the centralisation of revenue-generation powers will keep service delivery policy being tightly held at the national level, with state and local government funding attached to performance indicators. National reforms across health, disability services, aged care, early years, school education, further education and training will have struggled along, however those state governments that were far-sighted enough to commission proper evaluations of service reforms, such as those commenced by the Victorian Government in 2012-14, will win disproportionate funding for their states on the basis of delivering more effective outcomes for disadvantaged people.

•Health inequality: the economic case for health prevention will have been won, with significant health budget increases between 2017 and 2022, consolidating a national health inequality strategy, which took off within the health and social sectors in 2013. People look back on how the long fight to win plain paper packaging for cigarettes was just the beginning of a new approach to environmental and social health.

•Liveability: for all our major capital cities and key transport networks, investment by the federal government in rail will far outweigh that in new freeways between 2014 to 2020, while state and territory governments have prioritised rollout of bus

If we don’t want the future to be just like the past at the wider societal level, what

are we going to do differently in our organisations to help bring that about?


services and ICT-enabled service delivery across regional Australia, to enable citizens to manage their living costs and access services and opportunities as petrol prices went up.

•Affordable housing: Australia will be leading an urban development revolution, with a mass roll-out of affordable rental housing that was piloted and proven as a Superannuation–Government– Developer model, after the 2008 financial crisis led to a crisis of confidence in superannuation – just as the superannuation guarantee contribution (SGC) was lifted towards 15 per cent to secure the retirements of millions of Australians. To settle this tension, the superannuation industry, in partnership with governments, successfully invested in highly secure and socially beneficial social housing bonds during the volatile international financial climate of 2012-17.

•Investment in services: with more than 90 per cent of Australians convinced by the sector’s arguments that services should come before tax cuts, per capita funding is applied to a greater array of essential health, education and social care than back in 2012, and with highly accessible reporting on government revenues applied to such essential services.

•Prison policy: community fears about safety that intensified earlier in the decade into harsher sentencing and massive investment in prisons, have been assuaged by a variety of community-based crime prevention initiatives (tracked and monitored by the Smart Justice3 campaign hub, in partnership with heraldsun.online) that ensures a whole of government vision to diversion and rehabilitation is delivered. It is demonstrably cheaper than the old-fashioned, punitively expensive law and order agenda of years ago.

All these ideas have roots in work and effort that is occurring now. However, government cannot initiate and implement structural reforms without the leadership and participation of communities and the community sector.

At times of uncertainty – and especially at times of public sector funding cuts – the natural urge is to bunker down and resist change. However the global financial economy and lack of confidence or capacity by governments – state and federal – to borrow adequately to invest in Australia’s future look set to impose restrictions on recurrent funding for social spending for the next decade.

Right now, the challenge for the community sector is for movers, shakers and everyone in between to work together to ensure preferred visions for a more successful and inclusive society are not ditched – by governments or by ourselves. As a sector, we have the power to re-frame and reclaim change in ways that advance human rights, empowerment and better lives and communities.

Cath Smith was Chief Executive Officer of the Victorian Council of Social Service (VCOSS) from 2002-2012, and is now Director of Social Performance with strategic consultancy firm Futureye.

There is now an opportunity to work with state governments and both sides of politics in the lead

up to the next federal election to clarify the value and contribution of the sector, to demonstrate the wider social and economic risks of this being eroded, and

to demonstrate leadership for a preferred future.

3. Smart Justice is a Victorian campaign that promotes understanding of criminal justice policies that are effective, evidence-based and human rights compliant. See http://www.smartjustice.org.au/index.php


There’s been much attention on the establishment of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC) to strengthen accountability in the not-for-profit sector – and rightly so, argues ACOSS’s Tessa Boyd-Caine. But she says the sector also needs to look at some big questions beyond reporting requirements to fully explain its work.

The Productivity Commission’s not-for-profit (NFP) report in 2010 was a landmark study into the contribution of the community sector.1 It was the sixth study relating to the sector, but the first effort by an official body to define and characterise the Australian non-profit sector nationally, across economic and social factors. It found that the sector:

•encompassed some 600,000 organisations, of which approximately 59,000 were ‘economically significant’;

•accounted for 4 per cent of gross domestic product (not including the contribution of volunteers); and

•employed close to 890,000 people and utilised the services of some 4.6 million volunteers.

More recent estimates show that economic significance continuing to grow, with the sector now contributing 5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) and 8 per cent of employment in Australia.2

The PC told a story of a vibrant and diverse sector making significant contributions both socially and economically. At the same time the PC recognised that, until recently, very little was known about the Australian non-profit sector. Moreover, it argued that analysis of economic indicators alone failed to capture the sector’s ‘broader community benefits, some of which may be greater for the NFP sector than for government or business activity’.3 It reported a ‘growing interest in the sector prompted by, among other reasons, demands by donors and governments for improved performance evaluation to enhance accountability and provide more information on the effectiveness of their funding’.4

Regulation received considerable attention from the PC as one mechanism towards improved accountability. In our submission to the report, ACOSS argued that the sector was overly and ineffectively regulated. The PC recognised that the current regulatory framework for NFPs was ‘characterised by uncoordinated regimes at the Commonwealth and state/territory levels’ that were both costly and complex.5 This led to one of its key recommendations, and the most significant reform to date from the report: the establishment of a national regulatory framework for charities and non-profit organisations, the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC). The ACNC will be a major driver for improving the accountability of the Australian non-profit sector, as demonstrated by the first object of the ACNC Bill, which is, ‘to maintain, protect and enhance public trust and confidence in the Australian not-for-profit sector’.6 The ACNC will include a portal through which unprecedented levels of information about the sector, and the organisations that comprise it, will be available.

While there is widespread support for the ACNC within the Australian non-profit sector, submissions throughout the reform process have indicated significant unease about a number of related elements. One in particular has been what levels of information will be provided through the function of the ACNC’s portal; and how that information will be mediated for public consumption. Some organisations have been particularly anxious about the potential impact of the portal when starting from such a low base of information already available about the sector. There are also a range of concerns about what control, if any, the sector will be able to exert over the publication of information on the portal.

While the ACNC Implementation Taskforce clearly recognises its educative role with the information it makes available, there is also a critical role for the sector itself to determine what information best demonstrates its contribution; and how that information

Sector reform: unfinished business

08. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR DR TESSA BOYD-CAINE

1. Productivity Commission, Study into the contribution of the not-for-profit sector, Productivity Commission Research Report, 2010, http://www.pc.gov.au/projects/study/not-for-profit/report

2. Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Oral testimony of Paul Ronalds, First Assistant Secretary, Office of Work and Family, DPC to Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission Bill 2012 and an associated bill Inquiry, Standing Committee on Economics, 26 July, retrieved at bit.ly/pkwhyjcopy

3. PC, 2010, at p.XXVI

4. Ibid at p.305. Ibid at p.1136. ACNC (2012) Australian Charities and not-for-profits Commission Bill 2012,

Exposure Draft, section 15-5, http://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/House_of_Representatives_Committees?url=economics/nonprofit/2ndvacnc%20bill%20-%20exposure%20draft.pdf

So focused have we been to date on the government-led establishment of a

national regulatory framework, that we have not created the space for a broader discussion across the sector about what

information we want to gather and present to paint our own picture of what

we do and why it matters.

should be disseminated. Yet so focused have we been to date on the government-led establishment of a national regulatory framework, that we have not created the space for a broader discussion across the sector about what information we want to gather and present, to paint our own picture of what we do and why it matters.

Importantly, the PC didn’t stop at recommendations for a national regulatory framework and reform to the definition of charity. It set a blueprint for wide-sweeping reforms that would build on the social and economic contribution that not-for-profits make already; and the recognition of that contribution among funders, supporters and the general public. Most importantly, it pointed to a whole series of directions in which the sector can lead this work. These included establishing evaluation and measurement frameworks; developing and fostering innovation; and building diverse and sustained relationships across all sectors of our economy and society.

Non-profit organisations pride ourselves on identifying social needs and finding solutions to them through independent, community-led approaches. As government and non-government funders alike call for greater transparency over these activities, there is an opportunity for the non-profit sector to develop the models through which our social and economic contribution is measured. Until processes such as routine data collection, analysis and dissemination are adopted and supported widely across non-profits in Australia, the sector will not be able to develop an understanding about our activities and their outcomes; and to translate that understanding into the public trust and confidence that are so vital for an effective and sustainable non-profit sector.

We need to work out how to achieve a sector-led transformative process towards strong accountability – beyond reporting requirements to funders or regulators. How do we engender a commitment to openness and transparency as a core principle of practice in the not-for-profit sector? What effect should that commitment have on accountability by organisations individually and within the sector more broadly? Equally important as the ‘how’ and the ‘what’ is the ‘whom’? While it is commonplace to talk about NFPs as though they constitute a coherent sector, the reality is far more complex. What do community services have in common with religious, sporting, arts or cultural organisations? Where do non-government, non-corporate funders like philanthropists sit on this spectrum?

These are not new questions but they are unfinished business, not just from the PC report but from the broader agenda of strengthening the independence and value of our sector. How do we want to define ourselves? How do we want to evaluate our own effectiveness? What are the indicators against which we want our contribution to be measured? And what do we want to do as organisations within the sector, to drive those processes? These are the questions we need to be constantly considering ourselves if we are to maintain a strong, vibrant and independent not-for-profit sector.

Dr Tessa Boyd-Caine is Deputy CEO of the Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS)


The Hon. Mark Butler, Minister for Mental Health and Ageing, Minister for Social Inclusion, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister on Mental Health Reform.

1. Given your experiences to date with aged care and mental health reform, what do you think is the scope for progressive reform of social policy in Australia?

The scope for progressive social policy reform is really significant in Australia. We have a fiscal and budgetary position which is very much the envy of the world, a capable and expert public service providing good advice, and a strong and experienced not-for-profit sector with a track record of efficient and effective service delivery. We also have a long tradition of strong (and often early) public policy responses to some of the major issues we have faced as a community: whether that be with reforms like Medicare, or superannuation, or more recently our National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), aged care and mental health reform packages. To pursue and achieve these sorts of reforms is why I – and many of my colleagues – got into politics.

This year’s Budget actively addresses the challenges of aged care reform head on. We have an ageing population, and at the same time we have a decreasing workforce and a reduced number of carers. The generation of baby-boomers will live longer and will expect more from their aged care services.

These changes require a substantial shift in society’s mind set, and the reforms are the first step in preparing the aged care system for these future challenges.

There has also been significant progress in mental health reform, in very large part as a result of our record $2.2 billion budget package from 2011 which is now well into implementation. Through our reforms we are greatly improving access to mental health services and information, we are better targeting services to people and groups that have otherwise missed out, and we are tackling fragmentation of the system and improving integration of services.

2. Recognising the establishment of the new national mental health consumer reference group, how should governments ensure consumer and community interests in the delivery of services, particularly in areas like mental health and aged care?

The Australian Government recognises the importance of supporting consumer and carer interests in the delivery of services. The focus on consumers and carers – and the lived experience of mental illness – is evident in our approach to reform. We have strived to put the consumer at the centre of the system and worked closely with consumers and carers to adequately address their interests in the delivery of services.

IN CONVERSATION: MARK BUTLER


The work of the National Mental Health Consumer Organisation will help build a strong and consolidated consumer voice to contribute to more responsive and accountable mental health developments over the long term. This will complement the work of the National Mental Health Commission, which will monitor and report on the performance of the mental health system. The Commission is already incredibly active in engaging consumers and carers in a collaborative discussion about ways mental health policy and services can be improved and developed.

As part of our Living Longer Living Better aged care reform package, consumer directed care (CDC) will be extended to all home care packages and eventually to residential care settings. CDC will be provided on an opt-in or opt-out basis, and allow consumers and carers to exercise enhanced choice and control over their care arrangements. In practical terms, this provides greater scope for the purchase of care and home support services, and even entertainment options.

In both mental health and aged care reforms a wide range of groups including consumers, carers, service providers, and workforce groups, were consulted. This will continue throughout the implementation of these reforms: it is critical to their success and their longevity.

3. What are your priorities in the Social Inclusion portfolio and how will you measure your success?

Social inclusion is about levelling the playing field so that every Australian has the same opportunities to access education, get a job and actively participate in society. As a Labor government, principles of social inclusion are fundamental to our decision making and how we govern.

The Australian Government has made substantial investments to improve social inclusion in Australia. These investments in people – such as increasing social housing, Closing the Gap, investments in mental health, employment participation and aged care reform, and our commitment to the NDIS – are at the core of the social inclusion agenda.

As the Minister for Social Inclusion, I have three key priorities that are closely aligned. Firstly, I need to ensure government and the community have a strong evidence base on the key indicators of exclusion. The Australian Social Inclusion Board recently released the second edition of the How’s Australia faring report, which signals not only the challenges and opportunities, but how far we have progressed since the Prime Minister became Australia’s first Minister for Social Inclusion in 2007. As a nation, we have a score card which many nations would be proud to have, with high rates of employment, good health and high

educational attainment. However, there are still too many Australians who continue to experience multiple and entrenched disadvantage.

I also have a keen interest in how government delivers services to individuals and communities – and, hopefully, increasingly with individuals and communities. Whole-of-government service delivery is challenging – but without joined-up and holistic services to help the most vulnerable in our community, we won’t make the progress we need to make.

Finally, there are key areas of disadvantage that I have commissioned the Australian Social Inclusion Board to provide advice to the Government on during their current term: the increased risk of homelessness faced by older women, improvements to employment services especially for the most disadvantaged, and the supports and services that can improve the financial capability of those on low incomes.

We know that achieving lasting and comprehensive social inclusion in Australia is one of our most complex social policy challenges, but it’s an important one and one in which this government has shown some real leadership.

4. Social inclusion implies a whole-of-government response to disadvantage: what challenges have been encountered by the Office of the Not-for-Profit Sector in coordinating reforms across the Government?

Whole-of-government agendas like this are challenging, but can be tremendously rewarding. Setting up an office like this, and locating the Office in a First Minister’s Department (a so called ‘central agency’,) is really helpful in driving reforms across the government, and across jurisdictions. But the social inclusion agenda is about all sectors of the community – governments, but also the business community, the not-for-profit sector, local communities and individuals. It’s about breaking out of silos and breaking down inertia to find new and more effective ways of empowering the disadvantaged with wrapped around services and a strong focus on achieving outcomes.

The Office has also been a key first step in achieving some of the big complex reforms within government. One of the key aims of the not-for-profit (NFP) reform agenda is to reduce red tape for government funded NFPs. A new Commonwealth regulator, the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC), is the essential first step in driving long term reform that reduces the regulatory burden on the sector and harmonises federal, state and territory regulations so that the sector can get on with doing what it does best.


5. What does a social democratic vision of society mean to you? Do you see Australia moving towards the UK’s ‘Big Society’ reforms and, if so, what are the risks or benefits?

I spoke about this on the ABC’s Q&A a few weeks ago. First of all it’s important to note that the Labor Government has no plans to cut funding to the non-government and social sectors: ‘Big Society’ in some quarters is often a stalking horse for dramatic cuts to services and a dilution in the social compact between governments and their citizens.

But we certainly do support capacity building and empowerment of the not-for-profit sector – this is one of the key aims of our not-for-profit reforms. One element of the ‘Big Society’ agenda in which we do see value is the delivery of some government services through not-for-profit organisations and civil society. Australia has been doing this for many years now, with successes and failures.

It’s also important to note that there are some profound differences between Australia and the United Kingdom, where much of the ‘Big Society’ debate is occurring. In Australia we have a much smaller government spend than the UK. Our state has typically spent about 35 per cent of GDP, while the UK spends about 50 per cent of GDP on government services. And the difference there has often been filled by a vibrant community sector, that has for some time done the sorts of things that those advocating for a ‘Big Society’ in the UK would like to see happen. Europe and Great Britain went down this path, post-war, of building a better society in the wake of the Depression and World War II largely based on a big state. We didn’t do that. We had a relatively small state: one of the smallest spends on government services in the OECD. But critically we have also nurtured our community sector in a way that I think many would now like to see happen in the UK.

The key lesson for me is that our collaborations with the NFP sector need to be done sensitively and in a way that maximises outcomes. We can’t afford, as a community, to go down such a path based on some

sort of rash ideological purity. Rather, our path needs to be guided by the evidence, and based upon a widespread community commitment to support for the disadvantaged, delivered through a diverse and capable non-government sector – a sector which we respect and which we listen to.

6. Prime Minister Julia Gillard has stated that Labor is the party of ‘work, not welfare’. Do you think it can be both?

Well first of all it’s important to note that the Prime Minister has said that we will always support those unable to work, and that that commitment is core to our values as a modern Labor Party. At the same time, employment is a powerful vehicle to increase personal and family wellbeing and social inclusion. This Government, under the Prime Minister’s leadership, has had a strong focus on helping jobless families into work. Many people experiencing disadvantage face multiple, complex and long-term barriers to finding a job. Part of the social inclusion agenda therefore aims to ensure that the appropriate supports and services are in place to help people overcome those barriers and participate fully in our community.

For example, approximately 90 per cent of teenage parents on Parenting Payment do not have a Year 12 or equivalent qualification. The dual impact of low education attainment and parenting responsibilities at a young age can contribute to long term welfare dependency. Our Helping Young Parents initiative, which commenced on 1 January 2012 in 10 disadvantaged locations across Australia, provides tailored support to teenage parents to help them undertake education or training leading to the attainment of a Year 12 or equivalent qualification; and to participate in activities that focus on the health and early childhood development of their children. Another tangible example is the Family Centred Employment Project (FCEP) which is demonstrating a new approach to assisting jobless families across three sites in Australia, including Broadmeadows in Victoria. These are the sorts of holistic programs and modern services we need to commit to and build upon.


7. The community sector is facing big changes and challenges that could fundamentally shift its role and capacity in the coming decade1. What is your vision for how government and sector organisations can collaborate to manage these changes?

The National Compact: working together provides a framework for Government and the NFP sector to find better ways of working together based on greater trust, respect and collaboration. We are also co-developing a Consultation Code of Best Practice that will underpin the National Compact. One tangible outcome we’re striving for is to cut the red tape and regulatory burden faced by community sector organisations in their interactions with governments. For example, the Commonwealth is creating a ‘charity passport’ so that charities registered with the ACNC need not provide the same basic information over and again to each separate agency.

Another marker of our commitment to collaboration is the NFP Sector Reform Council – which we set up recently, again within the Prime Minister’s Portfolio. It has had a strong voice and been a strong leader on what have been large but important reforms. The Government will continue to provide real opportunities for the sector to have a voice on public policy.

To take a specific example, under the aged care reforms, the resounding message from consumers and their families is the preference for aged care to be delivered at home. This requires a marked shift in the way that services are delivered, and the Government and community sector must work together to better meet the needs of consumers in a streamlined way. Key elements of the aged care reform package focus on Home Support and Home Care packages, carer support and the Workforce Compact. These set a framework for collaboration between the Government and sector organisations to better support the needs of consumers.

8. Should the Government take a more proactive role in shaping the structure and capacity of community sector organisations? If so, how can it do that without losing the diversity and independence of the sector?

The Commonwealth’s reform agenda is focused on promoting the long term sustainability of the sector.

While the ACNC is being established to regulate charities and determine the legal status of entities seeking charitable and public benevolent institution status, it will do much more. A public information portal will be developed by 1 July 2013 to give greater visibility of the purpose and activities of charitable entities. This will help build stronger public confidence, promote the sector’s contributions and provide a strong base to encourage greater public and private support for our charities. Every step of the way the Government has sought the input of the sector in these important reforms – they should have a view on the framework within which they operate.

This is a grown up, sophisticated and capable sector though. We respect that on this side of politics and want to work with, rather than gag or straightjacket, this diverse and innovative community of organisations.

9. What books are by your bed?

I’m just finishing the first book in Frank Moorhouse’s Edith Trilogy – Grand Days. It’s about the League of Nations and a young ideological Australian woman working hard in fascinating times. It’s set in Paris and Geneva: a far cry from Port Adelaide, but I like it all the same.

My favourite novelist at the moment though is Jennifer Egan, who won the Pulitzer last year for A Visit from the Goon Squad. She wrote a wonderful book in 1995 which I’m really enjoying called The Invisible Circus.

1. These include increased pressure on government revenue, an ageing population, increased competition by for-profit providers in community services, changing patterns of voluntarism, complex regulatory systems at multiple levels of government, workforce development, and social and housing bonds.


When funding gets tight, it can be harder to bite the hand that feeds you. Naomi Eisenstadt talks about the risks for the community sector in tougher times – and ways to maintain influence and integrity.

The role of the community sector has been evolving over time both in the United Kingdom and in Australia. Tensions have always existed between the sector and government and those tensions are often productive. But more recently the very tight financial constraints in place in the UK have brought to the fore some of the key dilemmas facing a sector that wants to be both a provider of state services and a thorn in the flesh of the state; a sector that on the one hand wants a bigger role to play, while still having serious concerns about a shrinking state, even if that means an enlarged community sector.

So, what is actually happening at local level in Britain to community organisations? Both small and large voluntary bodies are facing big cuts to their funding. Local authorities were encouraged by the previous Labour Government and the current Coalition Government to contract out their services to community organisations. There were three arguments in favour of such arrangements: they encouraged a diversity of providers, giving service users more choice; community organisations could be more innovative, demonstrating new ways of service delivery; and they were seen to be more responsive to their users than state provided services. However, the downside to these presumed benefits is the ease with which funding can be reduced or cut all together. If a local government organisation wants to save money, they face the costs of redundancies to their own staff, and often the fury of local service users. Cutting an organisation for which there is a contractual relationship is considerably easier, and cheaper, and often politically safer than cutting directly provided services.

A period of substantial cuts to community organisations poses a number of dangers. The most obvious one is a loss of often well used and highly regarded services. In Britain, this is already being felt, particularly among youth services which have been hard hit. Moreover, changes to benefit entitlements and rising unemployment are causing increased demand for the very services that are being cut, both in the statutory and voluntary sectors.

But the most serious risk is that the role of campaigning and advocacy also comes under threat in times of austerity. Organisations that both campaign and provide direct services will be more cautious about publicly criticising the government if they fear loss of income. Organisations will become more inward looking, more competitive and less likely to collaborate as times get increasingly tough. Precisely when service users could benefit from stronger advocacy and better coordination of services, both the public and community sectors will be closing ranks and protecting their own existence. In Britain the private sector is offering to do more for less, a tempting prospect for cash strapped local authorities.

The danger is that an environment of funding threats will reduce the willingness of community organisations to actively campaign on the part of their beneficiaries. Fear of loss of funding may make service-providing organisations more risk averse in their advocacy activities.

How should the sector respond in these difficult times? Having worked for many years both in non government organisations and as a public servant, I know how critically important it is to foster effective relationships with government. This is particularly difficult in Australia, given the federal and state structures, and, as is currently the case, given the challenges presented when power is held by different parties at different levels. Balancing the need to maintain positive relationships so that influence is possible with the need to be seen to be speaking up for the rights and needs

Politics, policies, and changing times

014. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR NAOMI EISENSTADT

of members and service users is always difficult. Below are some tips on how community organisations can maintain both influence and integrity.

Avoid the temptation to whinge about funding. I attend many ‘round table’ events, consultations,

and conferences with Ministers present. Invariably organisations will complain about their own funding. This sounds to public servants and politicians like special pleading, and a stronger concern for the organisation rather than the issues which affect beneficiaries. I have never seen this tactic to be effective. Particularly when money is very tight, it is likely to irritate more than influence, and will also irritate community sector partners in the room who did not get their whinge in first.

No matter how difficult, try to find something that state or federal government is doing well

for your beneficiaries. It sounds basic, but try not to treat individuals as if they neither understand nor care. This may be true, but it is not likely to win friends or influence policy.

In consultation with beneficiaries, choose the two or three really critical issues, and fight hardest

on those issues. Make sure these are the issues that really affect users. For example, disability charities successfully argue for better car parking facilities; they don’t build car parks.

If possible, find common cause with other organisations. Government is more likely to

listen to a range of groups making similar arguments, particularly if they are accompanied with real case studies that illustrate the problem. Try very hard to privately agree on policy lines and stick to them. Ministers love it when the charities themselves can’t agree on a way forward.

Related to the above, if possible, try to provide solutions that address what the government is

concerned with as well as what will help your cause. This is particularly effective with public servants who will want to find solutions that politicians can accept.

Along with case studies, use data in ways that promote the cause but do not reinforce

prejudices. There is always a temptation to exaggerate the problem or to present accurate data in ways that mislead. A classic one is that children from disadvantaged backgrounds are ten times more likely to be in trouble with the police than the general population. This implies that most children from troubled backgrounds are involved in criminality. In fact it is 10 per cent of children, versus one per cent of the general population. Using data can stigmatise precisely the groups an organisation is in business to support. It is unethical even if it is successful at raising funds.

Australia seems to have weathered the economic storm engulfing Europe and the US. In the UK we are facing very tough times, and our ability to mitigate the impact on the most vulnerable is severely tested. The community sector has a crucial role to play as long as it argues the case for its beneficiaries and not for itself.

Naomi Eisenstadt is the former Director of the United Kingdom Social Exclusion Task Force and is now a Senior Research Fellow at Oxford University. She was keynote speaker at VCOSS’s 2011 Congress.

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Precisely when service users could benefit from stronger advocacy and better coordination of services,

both the public and community sectors will be closing ranks and protecting their own existence.


The global financial crisis and political reform have unleashed a wave of changes to the way the community sector operates in the United Kingdom. It means tough times for services and those they serve, but – counsels Julia Unwin – it is in these moments that civil society can find its strength.Many things differentiate the United Kingdom and Australia – different political histories and traditions, different relationships, and different ways of doing business. But we share two important things: a vibrant, long-standing and dynamic civil society, and – despite Australia’s relative weathering of the global financial storm, we both face global shifts in climate, resource and demography.

It has been easy in the years since 2008 to talk about a global crisis – the collapse of major banking institutions, and consequent loss of trust in elected governments, media and other institutions, helped along by fast moving, digital communication.

The real issue, however, is not the excitement of the crisis but the real difficulty of the transition. It is in managing through and learning how to flourish during that transition that the voluntary and community sectors have such an important role to play.

The first transition to make is that of money. The global financial crisis of 2008, subsequent Euro zone problems, and the recognition of the scale of both sovereign and individual debt, had a number of effects, all globally felt. The most obvious of these has been the response of national governments to reduce public expenditure and, to varying degrees, introduce programs of austerity. In most countries the impact of this has been threefold: •cuts in the provision of public services and changes

to the systems of support for people living in poverty,

•reduced funding support to the voluntary sector, and

•long-term low prospects for economic growth.

It was possible for a time to see this as a temporary adjustment. But the notion that we will snap back soon to runaway growth and high levels of public expenditure now seems remote. Instead we face a decade or more of either very slow growth or continuing depression. The transition to less money may be an important and salutary reminder for bloated businesses, inefficient governments, and even spendthrift individuals. For people and places in poverty it can be catastrophic.

The second transition is the shrinking of available natural resource. No Australian reader needs a reminder of the perils of running out of water or oil, and the ways in which we need to adapt – both to use fewer resources and to survive the shocks generated by climate change. Yet both globally and locally those who use the least of the world’s resources are paying the highest price1 and bearing the highest burden of climate change events. From floods in Bangladesh to heat waves in the poorest parts of the world, yet again we face a transition that seems to bite most severely on the poor and the dispossessed.

The third is the transition to accommodate our changing demography. The extraordinary triumph of the 20th century which means that we live ever longer, healthier and more active lives has reshaped society. Fewer children are being born in the developed world, and people are living longer. Our society is therefore ageing, and requires different skills, different priorities and different ways of operating – creating opportunities and challenges. We risk an outpouring of inter-generational tension and abandonment of the frail and the weak to lives of abject misery and loneliness.

Finally there is the transition to accommodate the digital revolution which threatens to divide those who are digitally fluent from those who are still experimenting. These four transitions together have helped fuel a climate in which trust risks being the scarcest

1. See the work by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation on climate change and social justice at http://www.jrf.org.uk/work/workarea/climate-change-and-social-justice

Demanding a just transition

016. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR JULIA UNWIN

commodity of all. Institutions – both political and market – have squandered trust. The global financial crisis has been sometimes as much a crisis of trust and sentiment as real.

THE CHALLENGE OF TRANSITION

Each of these direct shifts has changed the way in which the voluntary and community sector operates, and its future prospects and development. But responding to transition, helping others through change, is at the heart of how the sector operates. In a very real sense, this is now the hour for civil society.

We know that trust is re-built locally – at the level of the neighbourhood, in places where people know each other, and care for each other, even when it is in short supply for national or global institutions.

We also know that the wellsprings of human solidarity are refreshed locally. It is local organisations that are responding to destitution in the UK by setting up food banks, and providing shelter for the homeless. It is local organisations that are pioneering what it is like to make a neighbourhood – or a city – dementia-friendly. It is local bodies that mobilise volunteers to respond to emergencies, or to celebrations, and it is local community-based organisations that feed the networks which enable resilience.

And it is community and voluntary organisations that provide the platform for the dispossessed, gathering the information that confronts both the state and the market with evidence of failure, and say – ‘enough, we must change tack’.

The great transition we are living through challenges fundamentally the old settlement about the role of the market, and its effectiveness as an agent of distribution and wealth accumulation. It challenges the role of the state as provider, enabler, and regulator. And it calls on civil society to deliver more and differently.

In the UK this has been expressed politically by the ‘Big Society’ mantra: a statement from government that requires mobilisation of individuals and their organisations, at just the time when those very individuals and organisations are under massive pressure.

At a time of major public expenditure cuts the ‘Big Society’ brand has become politically toxic. It has equated reduction in the power and expenditure of the state with an automatic increase in the capability and resilience of the community sector, and entirely wrongly assumed a causal connection between the two.

Yes, the huge transitions through which we are living do demand a changed contract between the community, the market, the family and the state. But like all contracts that requires change from all parties – not unilateral withdrawal, or change of mandate, from one.

THE TRANSITION TO LESS MONEY MAY BE AN IMPORTANT AND SALUTARY REMINDER FOR BLOATED BUSINESSES, INEFFICIENT GOVERNMENTS, AND EVEN SPENDTHRIFT INDIVIDUALS. FOR PEOPLE AND PLACES IN

POVERTY IT CAN BE CATASTROPHIC.

A value base unites community organisations across the world. We can identify different funding mechanisms, different regulatory frameworks, and sometimes very different modes of operating. While these values are certainly not unique to the community sector, they are found within it and, at this time of external threat and challenge, they bear re-stating.

1. The value of mutuality and reciprocity. At the heart of most community organisations is the notion of mutual support and co-operative endeavour.

2. The notion of the gift given freely. Community activity is not instructed or mandated. People give of their time of their own free will.

3. Its position of independence. Community groups must speak truth to power, and they cannot give away that power.


A HISTORY OF TRANSITION

The voluntary and community sector has been through major transition before.

The 19th century brought almost unimaginable change to the UK. The apparently breakneck speed of industrialisation was truly shocking. In the UK and United States, people left long-standing rural communities which, while they should never be romanticised as pre-lapsarian idylls, did provide continuity, stability, and certainty (and deeply repressive moral codes). People left this, along with grinding poverty, for the chaos, confusion, and squalor of the cities. In response, a multitude of new institutions were founded by churches, trades unions, universities and, of course, by those energetic driven philanthropists. Boys and Girls Brigades, Mothers Unions, university settlements. Housing estates, soup kitchens, moral rearmament and help for fallen women. Schools, hospitals, asylums, clinics, orphanages and libraries. This period positively bristled with invention and intervention to protect and support, chivvy and control the rapidly growing working class, and the terrifying and potentially dangerous underclass. From Mayhew to Orwell and all points in between, ‘the bitter cry of outcast London’, in the words of Gareth Stedman Jones2, resonated with activity and action. Civil society built civil institutions, and did so with vigour, energy, and drive. In all of this philanthropy was an active and engaged driver. That part of their legacy is with us whenever we look at our landscape. The optimism and sense of purpose that was the founding principle for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation was typical of the age.

What happened in the UK happened in its own distinctive way across the world as churches and faith groups, community organisations, voluntary and philanthropic bodies and civil-minded individuals banded together to enable survival, and then flourishing, in dangerous, challenging and potentially catastrophic circumstances.

AUSTERITY, DEPRESSION AND THE FUTURE There is a response to the current major transition that allows nothing but despair. Predicting that austerity and depression can bring nothing but hardship and misery to people and places in poverty is not difficult. Making the case that people and places in poverty are suffering worst and most is easily done. And bearing witness to the loss of revenue facing those bodies that exist to help the very poorest is important.

But such a counsel of despair does not change much. It is building strong social capital that will enable survival and change, and it is only by doing this that we can ensure that the poorest do not pay the biggest price for the global crisis.

In the UK this transition is extremely damaging to voluntary and community bodies. Funds are being cut, staff are losing their jobs and the language of the market is used to justify funding mechanisms and approaches that have no place in a society organised around the common good. There is real pain and loss and, as always, competition for scarce resources can drive the very worst of human and organisational behaviour.

At the same time there is a flowering of different sorts of organisations and activity, not least the 70,000 volunteers who staffed the London 2012 Olympics in a way that celebrated both individual achievement and collective excitement. New forms of community organisations set up and grow and, like all businesses, sometimes fail. Churches are moved to a different engagement, setting up micro businesses that in turn create more activity. The celebration of the small and the local can replace the drive for scale and for huge impact. The transition town movement3 is bringing together people who want to manage their own and the earth’s resources differently.

2. Gareth Stedman Jones, Outcast London: A Study in the Relationship between Classes in Victorian Society, Oxford, Clarendon, 1971.

3. See http://www.transitionnetwork.org/


AS ALWAYS, COMPETITION FOR SCARCE RESOURCES CAN DRIVE THE

VERY WORST OF HUMAN AND ORGANISATIONAL BEHAVIOUR.

Voluntary and community bodies in the developed world have, for the last two or three decades, received funding from the state and from the market. The discourse has been focused on funding standards and contracts, regulatory expectations, and conditions of service. All of this is positive, and part of a mature and increasingly professionalised sector. But it is not the organising principle of the sector. It is not the reason that trustees and governors sacrifice weekends and evenings to steer, strategise and support their charities. It is not the motive force behind the many volunteers who engage in order to build a better society. And professionalism, career paths, and equivalent pension arrangements will not by themselves drive a secure, sure and decisive path through the transition that we now face.

Community activity is messy, and disorganised. It is led by angry people who want to make their world a better place. But in building social capital, in fostering resilience and in creating the conditions in which people can thrive, this messiness is the expression of the solidarity and drive that is the only sure route through change.

It is community activity that will allow us to reframe the notion of growth, and ensure that social and cultural growth is acknowledged and valued alongside turbo-charged – or even sluggish – economic growth. It is community activity that will ensure that the proceeds of growth are distributed and that stewardship of the local economy protects as well as develops.

IMPLICATIONS FOR GOVERNMENT?

If this major set of transitions is driving changes in the community sector, this has major implications for government. Those parts of government – national, federal and local – that saw the voluntary and community sector as just another link in a long and complex supply chain will

continue to use the tools at their disposal. Commissioning, and contracting and measurement of key performance indicators will be the tools for those officials. And voluntary and community organisations will engage at precisely that level. Adversarial negotiations, driving down price and arguing about quality, will be the hallmark of this sort of engagement, and levels of funding will correspond precisely to outputs achieved.

But other parts of government, and especially those also engaged with the route through transition, will see the community sector as so much more. They will recognise the partnership in building social capital, in enabling resilience. They will bear the anger and the conflict recognising that it is in community development that strength can be found. Politicians addressing their own legitimacy – as challenged by the current transition as any other – will make common cause with those parts of the community sector that are enabling real and lasting change.

In a just transition community organisations have a powerful role to play. As convenors and deliberators, as providers of space for difficult conversations, and finally as organisers, they are essential to our recovery.

Julia Unwin is Chief Executive of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation in the United Kingdom. She was a keynote speaker at the 2009 VCOSS Congress.


In just two years, the dramatic ‘Big Society’ policy changes in the United Kingdom have redefined the role of the state. James Whelan looks at the impact on the community sector and the implications for Australia.

When the ‘Big Society’ philosophy was first championed by United Kingdom Prime Minister David Cameron, many in the community sector were enthusiastic. It was a promise for the sector to be involved in more meaningful and dynamic ways, able to take over at least as many of the former functions of government as the private sector. But its appeal waned once it became clear that the changes were accompanied by major community sector funding cuts, and implemented in a way that clearly advantaged large corporations over small community organisations as providers of outsourced public services.

‘Big Society’ ideas were first articulated by theologian, lecturer, founder-director of the conservative UK think tank ResPublica and author of Red Tory1, Phillip Blond, a recent visitor to Australia. Cameron drew on Blond’s ideas in the context of major cuts to public spending, leading critics to view the changes as simply a new presentation of the long-standing neo-liberal predilection for shrinking government through budget cuts, privatisation and outsourcing.

So what relevance do the UK’s ‘Big Society’ reforms have to an Australia cushioned so far from the worst effects of the global financial crisis?

Implications for AustraliaSome elements of ‘Big Society’ have been present at both the state and federal government levels in Australia for many years, and we are seeing a rising interest in ‘small government’ in Australia, including the recent such declaration from New South Wales Treasurer Mike Baird around a budget that will see 15,000 public servants retrenched. We have seen similar public sector cuts announced in other states and nationally – a blunt instrument to respond to declining revenues or to the ‘surplus fetish’ as former Reserve Bank governor Bernie Fraser described

it. In fact, Australia under-invests in public services compared to its international peers, committing about 35 per cent of its gross domestic product to public sector spending, against an Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average of 47 per cent. We also pay lower individual and corporate tax levels than most developed nations.

It is not clear that Australians support the anti-public sector rationale behind the cuts. Only 5 per cent feel that ‘ordinary Australians’ have benefited from privatisation and deregulation, and a clear (and bipartisan) majority believe corporations have been the main beneficiaries. There is little public appetite for privatising publicly-owned assets such as ferries and power stations. There has, however, been minimal discussion of the Federal Opposition’s pledge to sack 12,000 public servants, compared to the outcry when much smaller numbers of miners’ or manufacturing workers’ jobs are threatened.

Beyond the smaller government rhetoric, there are shades of ‘Big Society’ in Opposition Leader Tony Abbott’s enthusiasm for shifting responsibility for health and schooling to community organisations and similarities between the second instalment of his ‘Plan for Stronger Communities’ and the ‘Big Society’ policy framework. At the state level, an influential Western Australian government report concluded that the ‘public sector will increasingly act as a facilitator of services, rather than a direct provider, with all areas of service delivery opened to competition.’2 ‘Big Society’ reforms are believed to have been recommended by the Independent Review of State Finances commissioned by the current Victorian Government (with the final report yet to be released).

The ‘Big Society’ at work‘Big Society’ has a carefully crafted rhetorical foundation. Few people would refute the assertion that society is a good thing – who wouldn’t want a bigger one? Beneath this simple logic, the ‘Big Society’ mantra promises outcomes that many would desire: decentralising power from government and dispersing

SOCIETY

1. Blond, P, Red Tory: How left and right have broken Britain and how we can fix it, Faber and Faber, UK, 2010

2. Government of Western Australia, Putting the public first: partnering with community and business to deliver outcomes, Government Economic Audit Committee, 2008, [retrieved 15 May 2012] http://www.dpc.wa.gov.au/Publications/EconomicAuditReport/Pages/Default.aspx

too big a price

to pay?BIG

021. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR DR JAMES WHELAN

it more widely to communities and individuals; allowing citizens more control over their lives; encouraging cooperation and initiative; and inclusive governance and collaboration between providers and users in service design or delivery.

‘Big Society’ critics rarely question these aims, and many support them wholeheartedly. But the impacts of many ‘Big Society’ programs have contradicted and undermined these ideals (see table below). It is not only the mismatch between rhetoric and reality that should ring alarm bells, however: ‘Big Society’

advocates seem to view the relationship between the public sector and business sector, and that between the public and community sectors, as if they were seesaws – push government down and businesses or community groups will automatically rise up. The idea of a zero-sum relationship between the sectors – that volunteers, community groups and investors would rush in to fill the gap created by a rapid withdrawal of the public sector – is what links ‘Big Society’ most closely to the persistent neo-liberal idea that shrinking the public sector is necessarily a good idea.

Rhetoric Impacts*

Provide ’more of what you want’ (i.e. services).

•£81 billion ($121 billion) cut in public spending over 4 years including an average 19% budget cut to government agencies, 60% cut to the budget for new public housing and £7 billion ($10.5 billion) cut to the welfare budget.

•710,000 public sector jobs to go over six years.

•Health care provisioning broken up and outsourced in a way that was described as ‘dismantling’ the National Health Service.

Enable a diversity of service providers including new entrants to reduce reliance on government services and increase the voluntary sector’s involvement.

•Corporations and the largest charities have dominated the commissioning process: 35 of 40 Work Programme (employment agency) contracts were awarded to corporations, dominated by large corporate entities such as Deloitte, A4e and Serco.

Foster localism: more freedom and local control.

•Local government budgets were cut by more than a quarter in 2010-11 resulting in widespread cuts to programs and staffing of 10-20% and flow-on impacts on volunteer support and coordination.

Support community initiatives: ‘The ‘Big Society’ bank that can lend money and grant money to organisations… who want to expand and grow and do… brilliant things.’

•Community sector funding cuts of between £3-5 billion ($4.5–5.5 billion) are expected between 2012 and 2014.

•2,000 charities experienced funding cuts of £110 million ($165 million) in 2011.

Encourage volunteerism and a more ‘socially active’ Britain: citizens have ‘a moral obligation to undertake voluntary activities’ and to ‘do their duty’ by running services themselves.

•National Citizen Service for 30,000 teenagers in 2012, increasing to 90,000 by 2015. When it was initially proposed, this program was to have been compulsory and involved the military.

•Changes to employment programs have compelled some welfare recipients to discontinue volunteering.

Ensure accountability through a ‘payment on results’ approach.

•Southern Cross, a corporate chain of aged care facilities, received public funding, realised a profit of £600 million ($900 million) then collapsed, leaving 30,000 people at risk.

•The Chair of A4e, a for-profit employment services provider, paid herself over £8 million ($12 million) in dividends in 2011, whilst the company was accused of failing to meet targets. A fraud inquiry was launched into the company in February 2012.3

Leverage philanthropy and social investment.

•In 2010, only 10 organisations invested ‘meaningful injections’ of capital into the existing ‘social investment market’; just 6 contributed 90 per cent of the total £165 million ($247 million), compared to the much larger footprint of the community sector which had an income of over £35 billion (52.5 billion) in 2007.

3. Morrison, S & Merrick, J, 26/02/2012, ‘Exclusive: A4e and a £200m back-to-work scandal’, The Independent [retrieved 11 May 2012] www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/exclusive-a4e-and-a-200m-backtowork-scandal-7440966.html

Exchange rate calculated at 1 British pound = $1.5 AUD


Exchange rate calculated at 1 British pound = $1.5 AUD

Services by ‘any willing provider’At the heart of the ‘Big Society’ apparatus is ‘commissioning’ – the process of tendering the provision of community services to ‘Any Willing Provider’. ‘Big Society’ starts from the premise that services should not be delivered by a government entity unless a compelling case can be established.

This logic has been applied to the widest conceivable range of services including parks, libraries, post offices, hospitals, welfare-to-work employment programs, prisons, court and tribunal administration, payment processing, fraud, debt and identity-related services, police information and communication technology and training, ‘infrastructure and back-office functions’, health services, housing, planning and schools.

In addition to conventional for-profit and not-for-profit organisations, the commissioning process has encouraged tenders from public-private hybrids including employee-owned cooperatives or mutuals, new ‘neighbourhood councils’ and ‘spin-outs’, government agencies that have evolved into social enterprises or joint ventures. Of course, mutuals, cooperatives and other non-government organisations that provide services of value to their communities existed long before ‘Big Society’ appeared. The difference is the assumption that such organisations can and should deliver all the services that were previously provided by the public sector.

A rule of thumb, such as ‘if in doubt, outsource it’, is an appealingly simple decision-making framework. However we can learn first-hand from the UK, where the first comprehensive audit of the ‘Big Society’ policies by Civil Exchange revealed that corporations and the largest not-for-profit organisations have thrived while the community sector has cut services, retrenched staff and risked closures.4

Other studies confirmed the adverse social justice consequences of the UK Government’s changes, showing that many local government authorities had either scaled back or entirely abandoned services, with a ‘pronounced tendency for cuts to affect adversely services aimed at or heavily used by young people’. The new economics foundation concluded that the social impacts of ‘Big Society’ were being felt most by ‘the most vulnerable groups in society – those with the most complex needs, who are more reliant than most on public services...’ and that public spending cuts were ‘erasing years of investment in local communities’5.

Charitable investment and social entrepreneurship too is a big part of ‘Big Society’ – the notion that we can draw on the other two sectors, the corporate sector and the community sector, to work together in partnerships; that just as there is unlimited volunteer potential, there is unlimited social investment potential. Pull the state out of that space and corporates will partner with community sector organisations and leverage funds for social impact bond experiments like we are seeing in New South Wales, or start-ups of one kind or another which will tender to do public service work.

It hasn’t materialised yet. The amount of money that’s actually come forth from the corporate sector has been less than 10 per cent of that anticipated. Philanthropy also can come with strings attached, as the Gonski Review noted, and few philanthropic organisations fund administration, despite these costs being a crucial precursor to viable and effective services. The social scientists Davies and Pille6 have said that rolling back the state actually seems not to unleash a culture of volunteering, and charitable investment seeks to anticipate corporate investment rather than need.

In Big Society and Australia, we suggest that the relationship between the public, corporate and community sectors should be conceived as a three-legged stool: each is necessary, and pulling any one leg out is likely to topple social progress, or at least make it very unstable. Let’s hope Australians will learn the lessons from such a dangerous experiment before it can be repeated here.

CPD Fellow Dr James Whelan is a Fellow of the Centre for Policy Development and was lead author of ‘Big Society and Australia – how the UK Government is dismantling the state and what it means for Australia’.

4. Civil Exchange, The Big Society Audit 2012, www.civilexchange org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/THE-BIG-SOCIETY-AUDIT-2012_Civil-ExchangeFinal8May.pdf

5. new economics foundation, Cutting it, the ‘Big Society’ and the new austerity, November 2010, retrieved at http://www.neweconomics.org/publications/cutting-it

6. Gonski, D, Review of funding for schooling: Final Report, Australian Government, December 2011

7. Davies, J S & Pill, M, ‘Empowerment or Abandonment? Prospects for Neighbourhood Revitalization Under the Big Society’, Public Money and Management, 32(3), pp.193-200, 2011


ABC Learning Centres: the perils of small government(Extract from: Big Society and Australia1)

The ‘small government’ zeal of the UK’s ‘Big Society’ can have impacts that extend well beyond service delivery. As Gallop’s ‘four roles of government’ framework illustrates, the public sector also plays an active role in making laws and rules, developing, monitoring and enforcing policies and programs, and managing government finance. When these functions are neglected, there is considerable risk.

Australia’s approach to pre-school childcare is not an example of outsourcing or privatisation. The care has never been provided by government and so has not been outsourced; rather the childcare welfare payments to parents effectively provide a significant level of government subsidy to the industry. However, this is an area where the private sector has been expected to provide a significant proportion of the service, and this has had consequences for the quality and reliability of the care. The case of ABC Learning Centres Limited shows the risks of having large profit-driven entities responsible for the care of pre-school children.

When it financially collapsed in late 2008, ABC Learning was Australia’s largest provider of childcare services, with a market share of approximately 25 per cent; it owned over 900 centres, employed more than 16,000 people, and cared for the children of more than 95,000 families. Its collapse led to the longest period of receivership in Australia’s history, required negotiations with the federal government and resulted in special subsidies to 262 unviable centres and a $15 million loan to the eventual purchaser of the other centres.

A critical reason for the unique approach to this insolvency was that, unlike most businesses, operations could not simply be shut down. The loss of a childcare place will, for many families, mean that one parent will not be able to go to work. Placing 95,000 families in this situation (on top of the 16,000 jobs directly threatened) simply could not be allowed to happen.

In this case, due to the scale of the problem, government action was taken. But for individuals the problem is just as severe if even one childcare centre is forced to close unexpectedly. Private sector competition means the possibility of failure, and such failure saddles young families with a difficult problem and the resulting financial and emotional stress. The failure of ABC Learning required government subsidies and loans, showing the need for government backing of pre-school childcare.

Even before the consequences of ABC Learning’s financial failure became apparent, another issue was being raised: the quality of the care provided.

It has been observed that childcare has a number of features that make it problematic for private provision. As well as the consequences of centre failure, the difficulty for parents of measuring the quality of care means that there is little control on the profit maximisation motive of the private sector leading to compromise on care standards.

Also, the high demand and geographically uneven distribution of centres can substantially limit real choice. Empirically, a survey of staff in childcare centres indicated a significantly lower standard of care in ABC Learning centres as opposed to community-based centres… (C)ost-cutting practices, such as not hiring professional cleaners, which reduced carer time with children, were also reported to impact on care standard in ABC Learning centres.

The problems associated with ABC Learning show clearly the risks involved with allowing childcare centres to be run by corporate chains. This is of particular concern since the proportion of childcare centres run by chains is increasing. This means that if childcare is left to the private sector, it could result in a reduction of the standard of care given to children, and increase the burden of uncertainty placed on young families. And the rapidity of ABC Learning’s growth – from 43 centres in 2001 to 940 in 2008 – shows how quickly this process can accelerate.

1. Extract taken from Big Society and Australia, Chapter 4, ‘Commissioning corporations; diversity or cartels?’

024. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR DR JAMES WHELAN

ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR JO BARRAKET Leader, Social Enterprise and Innovation Research Program, Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies, Queensland University of Technology

The community sector is clearly facing industrial challenges at the moment, with recent changes that affect community sector pay scales. This is both a financial challenge for many boards and management and a real opportunity to confront some of the workforce issues that have affected the sector for many years.

Looking further into the future, I would say that the biggest challenges and opportunities for the sector relate to wider changes in society, some of which are having transformational effects. With our population ageing and diversifying, there are clearly implications for the types of community services provided, and for the people and organisations that deliver them. Perhaps more interesting is the changing nature of civic engagement – with a greater emphasis on spontaneous rather than structured participation that challenges traditional paradigms of volunteering and civic duty – which is likely to affect how community sector

organisations are run in the future. Add to this the growing demands for user-led service design and the increased opportunities for this kind of activity enabled by online technologies, and the composition and functions of the community sector of the future looks somewhat different. There are opportunities for community sector organisations to ensure their ability to adapt by engaging now with their members, service users, and organisational leaders of the future.

Finally, as competition for resources to respond to growing needs increases, the community sector and other parts of civil society will be increasingly called upon to demonstrate, rather than simply state, their social impacts. Just how to do this in a way that is beneficial to the sector and the people it serves is a very new conversation that requires real input and leadership from the sector itself.

PAUL SMYTH General Manager, Research and Policy Centre, Brotherhood of St Laurence/ Professor of Social Policy, University of Melbourne

The biggest challenges and opportunities over the next decade in Australia revolve around the mineral

boom. The nation can either use the proceeds to gear up for a robust future for all our citizens in the knowledge economy or fritter away the one-off bonanza in tax cuts and consumerism.

Social policy should be front and centre in the post-boom preparations. Investment in human capital – broadly defined to include education, skills, health and mental health – is the number one big policy lever governments have to pull. For optimal effect this investment has to become more pro-poor so that our human capital institutions do not continue to consign 5 to 10 per cent of Australians into the waste of economic and social exclusion.

The role of the community sector will be vital. The party political scene is not conducive to long-term strategic thinking, while contracting out has long robbed governments of serious in-house social policy capacity. The initiative could come from the sector. Its challenge will be to overcome its ‘mission drift’ under the ‘contract state’ and rebuild its constituencies who share a vision of a better world, welcome the opportunity to help their neighbours, and will speak up for a fairer society.

VOX POPWhat are the biggest challenges and opportunities facing the community sector over the next decade – from outside and from within?


THE HON KEVIN ANDREWS Shadow Minister for Families, Housing and Human Services

The ageing of the population and the growing dependency ratio are amongst the most significant challenges facing our communities. They will require a careful, co-ordinated response if we are to ensure that the wellbeing of all people is valued and supported.

The need to value the community sector as the vibrant, necessary core of civil society will be central to this task. It remains an ongoing challenge. Importantly, government must acknowledge that the institutions of civil society exist outside the political sphere, and are not instruments of the State. The political community should support civil society. It should seek to empower it, not to exercise power over it.

In this way, initiatives for the common good can help to build supportive, caring communities in which the dignity of each individual can be upheld.

KASY CHAMBERS Executive Director, Anglicare Australia

Aside from the obvious (but nonetheless important) issues of changing demographics of the society as a whole, tight fiscal environments for social policy, competition for workers, changing attitudes towards work and commitment to organisations, pay structures in the short to medium term as the Fair Pay Case is enacted, etcetera… I think a number of seismic shifts are less often talked about.

The current reform agenda for aged care and the National Disability Insurance Scheme will drive a need for a differently skilled, differently attached workforce. Traditionally most community sector workers are driven by passion and a mission to change the world. We will need to find new ways to foster this as workers increasingly have less day-to-day contact with the organisation. This will also lead to more complex roles for individual staff which will need to be constantly negotiated as they work individually with clients in the community.

Improvements for most (people living longer, healthier lives; disabilities minimised via technology etc) does open up the risk of a smaller number of people becoming more marginalised, indeed the risk of a bifurcation in society. People who have lived their lives on the edges, for example, may continue to need a different style of aged care earlier than those with their own homes and better health.

One interesting conversation we seldom have is about the interface between volunteers and paid workers – as we professionalise roles in the community sector we almost disable the general community from taking part in people’s lives. Similarly well-meaning, community-enriching spirit is seeking different spaces to help knit community as traditional caring roles become professional. In a case of full circle, some roles that have professionalised, such as Emergency Relief staff and home support workers, are now being moved back to the community in recognition that this builds more sustainable social connectedness.

JOHN DELLA BOSCA National Campaign Director, Every Australian Counts

In the area of disability support where I have been focused we are currently going through a period of significant change.

Moving to the person centred approach envisaged by the National Disability Insurance Scheme means that people who require support will have greater choice and control over how they receive that support. This seismic shift in the way people with disability are supported requires the disability sector to change and develop the way we work. The community sector will need to be flexible, engaged and responsive.

One of the biggest challenges will be developing and retaining a skilled workforce able to provide high quality services and supports to people with a disability.


Finding better ways to fund and deliver community services will demand a greater appetite for risk and innovation from both government and the community sector itself, says Professor Peter Shergold.

One of the best pieces of news from the Commonwealth Government in the last year was the decision to provide $1.7 million to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to conduct a survey of the community sector in 2012-13. The so-called ‘satellite account’ will provide much-needed data on the scale, value, structure and growing importance of Australian not-for-profit (NFP) organisations.

What we presently know of the community is fragmentary and outdated. The dimensions slip off the tongue like a tired catechism: there are around 600,000 Australian NFPs; 50,000 are classified as ‘economically significant’; 56,000 have their charitable status registered and endorsed by the Australian Tax Office (ATO); and 20,000 are ‘social enterprises’, trading in pursuit of a surplus with which to support their mission.

Australia’s NFP sector includes some very large players such as clubs, hospitals, schools, unions and credit unions. However, most organisations are very small. Many exist only to meet the shared interests of their members. Most survive entirely on voluntary effort. They nevertheless play a significant role. They build networks of social capital and create bonds of civic engagement. Their members, bound together by mutual enthusiasms, enjoy richer lives and a stronger sense of well-being.

‘Community sector’ organisations have a broader mission to provide public benefit. Some are incorporated associations whilst others are companies limited by guarantee. Some focus exclusively on the delivery of services; others also advocate on behalf of those whom they serve. Some enjoy various forms of charitable status; others do not. Many find their ethos in the quest for social justice; others are driven by environmental or cultural goals.

Hopefully the ABS data will provide a much clearer picture of the teeming diversity of Australia’s community sector. Two things, however, are already evident.

First, the aspirations of community organisations are nearly always greater than the resources available to meet them. In times of economic austerity the situation becomes even tougher: demands for services often increase but funding becomes harder to find.

Second, by world standards, Australians are poor givers (especially amongst high net worth individuals); good joiners (more than 85 per cent of adult Australians are a member of at least one NFP); but even better helpers. It’s estimated that around a third of adult Australians volunteer each year. More significantly, the recent Better Life Index published by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) places Australia near the top of the international list when it comes to people believing that they can help or be helped by others. More than two-thirds of Australian respondents indicated that they had helped a stranger in the previous month, compared to less than half of those in the 34 OECD countries as a whole.

The message is simple. Australia’s economic performance is impressive. But it’s on the basis of our well-organised community sector that we can truly claim to be a world performer. That’s in part why Australia nearly always ranks higher in terms of the quality of our life than in our material standard of living.

Community sector organisations have helped to sustain this sense of social well-being during an era of economic transformation, significant demographic change, large-scale immigration and increasing ethnic diversity. It’s a remarkable achievement. My question is simple: is the commitment and boundless energy of community organisations, and the dedication of those who work for and support them, matched by the creativity of their approaches? Is the community sector innovative?

Risk-ready: it’s time for innovation

028. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR PROFESSOR PETER SHERGOLD

Driving innovationInnovative practice is more than the embrace of ‘new paradigms’. At the most basic level it means organising resources (inputs) into delivering services (outputs) more cost-effectively. The danger is that the progressive introduction of better workplace systems and structures may simply improve existing processes. It is more challenging to find new ways of ensuring that the activities undertaken are the best way to achieve the outcomes that represent the organisation’s mission.

To do so requires a social audit of the relationship between activity and vision and, even more controversial, the monetisation of the ‘social returns on investment’: as in, each dollar our organisation spends creates ten dollars of community benefits. The value of this evaluative approach lies not in the arithmetic calculation but in the application of a methodologically rigorous approach to ensuring that an organisation’s efforts focus on what it seeks to achieve. The process drives innovation through the identification of alternative, more focused programs. It also forces an organisation to test whether its mission has been framed correctly. This, too, is a form of innovation.

The pursuit of new modes of funding social mission can be equally innovative. Indeed the Australian community sector has been a leader in this regard. Australian NFPs have been at the forefront in undertaking the delivery of public services, with more than $26 billion annually being outsourced from governments to NFPs. Governments, today, could not operate without community organisations to do their business.

Community sector organisations also raise a significant amount of their revenue from trading activity. It’s not just the larger, well-established organisations. An increasing share of ‘social businesses’ are being established with a commercial orientation. They use trade as a source of revenue to create employment opportunities for the disadvantaged and/or to accumulate surpluses to fund their community mission.

Even more innovative is the manner in which community-based organisations are now seeking to harness capital from the private sector to support public purpose – from medical research to social housing and from prisoner rehabilitation to child care. New investment vehicles are being designed as social benefit or charity ‘bonds’. Offering ethical investors both a social and financial return, the bonds represent a bold new way of funding mission.

Innovation can also embrace new ways of looking at old problems. An obvious example has been the growing recognition that the best way of alleviating poverty in developing countries is not through the traditional delivery of aid but through offering microloans that tap the entrepreneurial enthusiasm of the poor. Many Australian NGOs are now leading exponents of this approach.

Finally, and most distinctively, innovation in the community sector can take the form of collaboration. In the private sector, competition is generally seen as the generator of innovative practice. In the world of NFPs that’s not necessarily so. The manner in which like-minded community organisations can form loose alliances of common purpose represents the basis of most modern social movements. Public support for racial and sexual equality, environmental protection, fair trade, human rights or animal welfare is living testimony to the creative capacity of the community sector. The movements bear testimony to innovation through collaboration.

Yet two things worry me about the extent of innovation in Australia’s community sector. First, it largely goes unrecognised and unappreciated. Second, it is under threat.

Burden of bureaucracyGovernments are both the best friend and worst enemy of community innovation. The extent to which community sector organisations are dependent on

Is the commitment and boundless energy of community organisations, and the dedication of those who work for and support them, matched by the creativity of their approaches?


securing government grants or, increasingly, winning contracts to deliver government programs, has provided a growing financial strength to the sector. At a time of economic volatility, in which philanthropic and corporate support is under pressure, government funding has been a source of stability to many welfare-oriented organisations.

Unfortunately government support comes at a cost. In a highly contested environment, with low entry costs to new community organisations, the payments for outsourced delivery of government services have too often been inadequate. This has meant that NFPs, supported by benevolence and volunteering, have ended up effectively subsidising governments. Community workers remain poorly paid. Thankfully, at different speeds and with varying levels of commitment, governments are now seeking to redress this systemic undervaluing of community activity.

More troubling, the risk aversion that is typical of governments (and their public services) is imposed on the NFPs that they contract. Too few community organisations get an opportunity to contribute their front-line experience to the development of public policy: too many find themselves constrained by contractual conditions and administrative guidelines from doing things their way. In a relationship premised on compliance rather than performance, the opportunity for innovation is often crushed beneath a burden of bureaucratic conformity.

I worry that things may get worse before they get better. I have been a supporter of the objectives of establishing an Australian regulator for the community sector in the form of the Australian Charities and Not-for-Profit Commission (ACNC). More transparent reporting and nationally consistent regulation are without doubt good things. The danger, particularly if there is not unequivocal agreement to uniform legislation by all jurisdictions, is that the burden of compliance and duplication will end up being even greater than it is at present.

The fact is that innovation, in all its various guises, requires risk-taking. Some new approaches will work, others won’t. Some new products will find a market, others will not. Community-based organisations may not spend as much time as corporations formally assessing their risk-appetite, but they certainly understand it. In an environment of fierce political engagement, with relentless media scrutiny of public expenditure, it’s much harder for governments to embrace risk.

On the really big issues – such as a goods and services tax (GST) or a carbon tax – political leaders will on occasion make a decision to risk their political

capital. On the everyday routine of government, which generally includes delivering community services, a greater degree of caution prevails. Too often public services seek to standardise delivery and, in the process, severely reduce the autonomy granted to contracted NFPs.

Catalysts for changeThankfully both sides of the relationship are coming to appreciate the debilitating effect of such cautionary conformity on innovation. Governments increasingly extol the value of partnership between themselves and the community sector. The challenge is turning the fine rhetoric of collaboration into reality. A well-meaning statement of principles, unless it’s embedded in administrative practice, will all-too-soon be filed in the electronic trash.

The truth is that the bolder ambitions of public administration – a ‘citizen-centric’ approach to programs, with more ‘place-based’ and ‘self-directed’ approaches to service implementation – can only be realised if community sector organisations are actively encouraged to trial different approaches. Public administrations need to facilitate new ways of delivering human services, new forms of cross-sectoral funding for community purpose and new methods for measuring the long-term impact of community interventions. Rather than acting as controllers they need to regard themselves as catalysts for social innovation. Innovation can be stimulated by governments and NFPs both recognising themselves as ‘co-producers’ of public benefit.

Equally important, community organisations need to eschew on occasion the temptation of government funding. It always comes with red-tape attached. Other sources of finance, whether from philanthropy, trade or social investment, generally impose fewer restrictions on innovative impulse than reliance on the public purse.

The community sector’s proud tradition of social entrepreneurship needs to be reborn fit for a 21st century world. Social innovation can be every bit as important to Australia’s future as the more visible transformation that we associate with the private sector. NFPs – from micro-businesses to large enterprises – can create new ways of looking at and responding to community problems.

Professor Peter Shergold is the Chancellor of the University of Western Sydney and former Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet.


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Workforce: what’s the strategy?The community services and health workforce is growing twice as fast as other industries in Australia and will generate one in four of all new jobs in the next few years, yet already it struggles to attract, retain and properly skill workers. Wallis Westbrook looks at the challenges and opportunities ahead.

Much discussion occurs within the community services and health industry1 about the future of the workforce and what it will take to design, plan, implement and evaluate better, integrated and more tailored services. In my mind this can be answered relatively simply – plan effectively for the workforce the industry will require. The first step is to understand what we want our business and organisations to be and to deliver, and then to describe the jobs and skills we need to make this happen.

Community services and health employers face many of the same workforce challenges as do employers in other industries:

•an ageing workforce

•increased competition for traditional labour sources

•improved engagement and use of the skills of the existing workforce

•leadership and management for innovation

•difficulty attracting and retaining skilled staff

•a complex education and training system and its perceived failure to deliver work-ready graduates in the time, volumes and locations required.

A further challenge specific to community services and health employers is a wide lack of understanding of the types of work and jobs that exist across the industry. There is a strong perception within the community that community services work is mostly voluntary or that you have to be a special person to do it: ‘I could never do that sort of job…’ is a response many of us have heard.

Finally, all industries are focusing on productivity and global competitiveness. This is a debate the community services and health industry at best has been reluctant to enter and at worst denies any relationship to, even to the point of not accepting that it is, in fact, an industry. It is struggling to find its place in this influential economic agenda and yet it is one of the cornerstones upon which industry development strategies and skills and workforce investment priorities are based.

To tackle these and the many other issues that employers face in attracting, developing and retaining their future workforce, the industry must articulate its central position (social and economic) and enhance its workforce planning and development capacity. Employers and the industry must engage fully in describing and profiling careers and work across the industry and communicate the opportunities to people wanting to work in meaningful and stimulating roles. Critically organisations should work together, positioning the industry by using the significant social and economic contribution it makes to the nation’s prosperity and the real difference that it can make to lives, from both frontline or backend positions.

The Australian Workforce and Productivity Agency (AWPA) recently released a discussion paper titled Future Focus: Australia’s skills and workforce development needs. Using four economy-wide scenarios to underpin industry and occupational growth modelling, it identifies that Health Care and Social Assistance will be the main employment growth industry to 2025 and that Community and Personal Services Workers will be in the top two highest growth occupations.2 Australian Bureau of Statistics labour force data (Table 1) reinforces the outlook on a state and territory basis.

1. This article refers throughout to the community services and health industry, rather than sector as it more commonly known. This is deliberate and seeks to reinforce the contribution that organisations and the system make to the overall economic and social prosperity of the nation. Denying we are an industry denies our economic impact and potentially limits our access to industry development strategies and resources.

2. Australian Workforce Productivity Agency, July 2012, Future Focus: Australia’s skills and workforce development needs, page 41, http://www.awpa.gov.au/publications/documents/Future-Focus-Australias-skills-and-workforce-development-needs-Discussion-Paper.pdf

032. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR WALLIS WESTBROOK

State/Territory Employed personsHealth Care &

Social Assistance employed persons

Health Care & Social Assistance employed persons

(%)

Health Care & Social Assistance industry rank by total employed

ACT 208,600 19,200 9.2 3rd

NSW 3,605,600 425,600 11.8 1st

NT 121,000 13,600 11.2 2nd

QLD 2,338,900 280,200 12.0 1st

SA 815,600 104,200 12.7 1st

TAS 233,600 32,100 13.7 1st

VIC 2,896,000 331,600 11.4 1st

WA 1,285,900 138,600 10.7 1st

Australia 11,537,400 1,345,000 11.6 1st

The AWPA will develop a National Workforce Development Plan based on this demand, but it is even more important for the industry to use this position effectively to attract, retain and develop its workforce. The community services and health industry is increasing at twice the average rate of all other industries, and is expected to generate around one in four of all new jobs by 2015–16.16 Yet follow the media and political agenda and most people would assume that it is other industries – resources, manufacturing, construction or others – that are facing the greatest impact of workforce and skill shortages.

The availability of labour and skills is the most significant threat to the future viability of community services and health organisations. The success or failure of services and programs will depend on the ability to attract and retain the workers with the right skills. If we can’t offer attractive jobs, work out what skills are needed, and train people to have them, service models will become impossible to deliver. Workforce issues need to be elevated in the strategic approach of organisations, industries, programs and regions.

In Queensland the Health and Community Services Workforce Council has been working closely with industry to develop workforce planning capability not just at the individual level, but at organisational level and within a place-based approach. In partnership with industry organisations, it has developed a range of practical strategies, aiming to create a shared understanding of common workforce issues and to support collaborative problem-solving. Some of the tools have included:

•regional workforce development networks

• industry workforce leaders groups

• working with schools and other industries

•an industry workforce planning framework and development strategy

•brokering skills and training opportunities

•staff exchange programs

•cross organisational mentoring

•remote area support services

•communities of practice

•action research and learning approaches

•developing participatory leadership skills

•recognising and sharing workforce innovation through industry awards and conferences.

The availability of labour and skills is the most significant threat to the future viability of community services and health organisations.

In the face of significant change and reform, new ways of working, new skills and new roles are emerging. Increased sophistication in choice and control amongst consumers and a drive to innovation and outcomes requires the industry to work collaboratively, apply strong organisational development and business planning processes and clearly plan for the skilled workforce it requires into the future.

To attract the next generation of employees and to continue to retain and develop existing workers, health and community services organisations need to develop and prioritise workforce planning and development as a key sustainability strategy.

Wallis Westbrook is Executive Director of the Health and Community Services Workforce Council in Queensland.

Source: ABS Labour Force Data, May 2012.

Table 1:

3. Community Services and Health Industry Skills Council, Environmental Scan 2012, page 9. https://www.cshisc.com.au/docs/research-reports/escan_2012_web.pdf


Governments are looking increasingly to place-based initiatives to address deep disadvantage. David Tennant assesses how the Shepparton welfare reform trial in Victoria meets some key elements for success.

When the 2011 Federal Budget announced Shepparton, Victoria as one of a handful of Australian locations to receive a package of Commonwealth welfare reform programs, it came as a surprise to the local community. The package included:

•the establishment of a Communities for Children (Enhanced) site

•new participation requirements for teenage parents

•additional obligations and activities for jobless families

•a trial of Income Management.

The first two elements in the list began on 1 January 2012, with the remaining two on 1 July 2012.1

All governments in Australia currently favour place-based initiatives as a tool for addressing pockets of deep locational disadvantage. The Australian Social Inclusion Board (ASIB) has backed the approach2 and released, in early 2011, a paper entitled Governance Models for Location Based Initiatives. Whilst focused on locations with populations of 5000 people or less, the five key elements it articulated provide a useful framework against which to assess the progress of the current welfare trials.

I will briefly compare each of these elements to my assessment of the transition process in Shepparton so far. Even though several of the reform measures only started recently, the fact that the announcements were made in May 2011 provides considerable scope to see how well the needs and views of the ‘place’ are being integrated.

1. CONNECTION BETWEEN LOCAL ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL POLICY

Any disagreement about the need for both social and economic policy to work together to tackle social exclusion tends to be about the weighting applied to each element, rather than the principle. For example, few people would argue against the value of a job in providing insulation against the impacts of poverty and disadvantage.3 There is however considerable disagreement on how to provide access to jobs and the best ways to tackle long-term unemployment from the perspective of those who are unemployed.

A number of sectors are being engaged in the Shepparton place-based transition process. There has been some useful discussion with small-to-medium enterprises about basic recruitment needs and approaches. Less attention has been paid to tackling longer-term structural issues. For example, questions about where new employment opportunities might come from, as opposed to cycling people through training and employment programs, were raised soon after the budget announcements but are yet to attract coordinated attention. No-one would realistically (or fairly) expect immediate answers to such difficult questions but the interrelationship of vibrant economic and social policy in Shepparton as part of this roll-out remains embryonic.

2. A FRAMEWORK FOR INTER-GOVERNMENTAL INTEGRATION

There are questions over the wisdom of announcing the place-based initiatives as part of the budget process.4 Certainly the manner and timing of naming the places was problematic, sparking media interest that focused on what made each of the 10 selected ‘disadvantaged’ communities so bad as to ‘make’ the list. There was no obvious explanation for the Shepparton community until some weeks later.5

The longer-term and more negative impact of the surprise nature of the announcement has been on intergovernmental communication and cooperation. All Commonwealth programs have now commenced, however is very difficult to find examples of genuine integration between the newly arrived programs and pre-existing state and local government initiatives.

A better approach might have been to announce the policy to work intensively with a series of select communities, then to speak with the various levels of government and key stakeholders prior to the public announcement of the locations. Far from delaying the roll-out, this may have built a sense of common purpose, if not in the detail of the individual elements of the trials, then at least in pursuing coordinated and sustainable improvements.

HOW ‘PLACE’ FARES IN PLACE-BASED SOLUTIONS

1. Macklin, The Hon J, MP, New approaches to address disadvantage in targeted communities, Media Release (joint), Canberra 10 May 2011. At the date of preparing this article, the Victorian and Commonwealth Governments had not executed a bilateral agreement on the child protection referral mechanism for Income Management. It is expected now to be a consensual model, rather than a mandatory referral measure as initially anticipated.

2. See for example: Australian Social Inclusion Board, Building inclusive and resilient communities, Canberra, June 2009.

3. The links between unemployment and poverty and disadvantage are clear. There is a considerable body of research to draw from, particularly associated with the HILDA longitudinal study. See for example, Marks GN, Income poverty, subjective poverty and financial stress, Social Policy Research Paper No 29, Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, Canberra, 2007.

4. ABC, Bush Telegraph, 18 July 2012, accessed at http://www.abc.net.au/rural/telegraph/content/2012/53548366.htm

5. Detailed information about the indicators used to select the ten ‘Building Australia’s Future Workforce’ trial sites was provided in answers to Senate Estimates Questions on Notice in June 2011. The first coordinated engagement between the various Commonwealth departments involved and the Shepparton community took place at a community meeting on 31 August 2011.

034. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR DAVID TENNANT

3. DEVOLUTION THAT SUPPORTS MEANINGFUL LOCAL INVOLVEMENT IN DETERMINING ISSUES AND SOLUTIONS

A key plank in the place-based roll-out was the Commonwealth’s stated commitment to be guided by advice drawn from local communities. The appointment of a Shepparton Local Advisory Group (LAG) in March 2012 was a significant step towards this, however timing was again a problem.

Before LAG appointees had even met for the first time, the Commonwealth advertised the existence of additional local facilitation resources, known as the Local Solutions Fund (LSF).6 The LAG was required to consider the applications and provide recommendations on which should be funded, though it had not met, had not engaged the community at all on the reform measures, and had not established its strategic priorities.

On this measure there is certainly potential. The Commonwealth should however resist the temptation to micro-manage the process and allow the community to debate the issues and form its own views.

4. CAPACITY DEVELOPMENT LOCALLY AND IN GOVERNMENT TO SUPPORT COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT AND DEVOLUTION

As noted in the previous element, there is potential for capacity development, effective engagement and eventual devolution of program responsibility. However, the term ‘trial program’ carries the risk that a lot of energy will be expended that disappears as soon as momentum is built. This is a comment with relevance beyond stakeholders like community service providers, government funders and policy developers. The people the welfare trials are meant to affect and ultimately assist get tired of being told about ‘ground-breaking changes’ to the support they can get. Generational change is hard to deliver in three-year funding blocks.

5. EFFECTIVE FUNDING, MEASUREMENT AND ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISMS THAT SUPPORT WHOLE-OF-GOVERNMENT AND COMMUNITY AIMS, RATHER THAN TRYING TO BUILD AN INITIATIVE TO FIT UNSUITABLE MECHANISMS:

There is no doubt the welfare reform trials have brought significant resources to the Shepparton community. That presents real opportunity to add to service and support capacity and to address service gaps or participation impediments. But again, so far we see more potential for the new resources to support whole-of-government and community aims rather than evidence that is already occurring.

As with the interaction between the LAG and LSF, rigid timelines have pushed funding out into the community ahead of appropriate scoping of what already exists or plans for integration. The likely consequence will be duplication and confusion, for service providers and users alike.

On a positive note, some well-credentialed independent evaluation bodies have been appointed to track the impact of the trials; for example Urbis (employment and training reforms) and Deloitte Access Economics (Income Management).7 However, much more public information is needed on how to engage with them and how they will engage with each other.

CONCLUSION

Shepparton is a community with challenges across a range of ‘disadvantage’ indicators.8 Receiving additional resources to tackle those challenges should be a positive thing.

For it to work best, however, the Shepparton community must be engaged in the process – part of articulating the problems and designing solutions. At the time of writing it is 14 months since the trial was announced and local engagement is only just beginning. Unless it becomes a central focus soon Shepparton will not be part of a place-based trial, it will just be a place required to host a trial for the Commonwealth.

David Tennant is the Chief Executive Officer of Goulburn Valley Family Care Inc (known as Familycare) located in Shepparton, Victoria. David is also a member of the Shepparton Local Advisory Group, providing advice to the Commonwealth on the Shepparton Welfare Reform Trial site.

6. The advertisement inviting Expressions of Interest for the Local Solutions Fund appeared in the Shepparton News on 23 March 2012. The Shepparton Local Advisory Group met for the first time on 27 March 2012.

7. Brief information about the Deloitte Access Economics evaluation can be found at http://www.fahcsia.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/07_2012/ims_bafw_vi_0.pdf . I have been unable to locate any public announcement of the Urbis review.

8. Interestingly Shepparton does not appear in the list of most disadvantaged Victorian Urban areas in either Tony Vinson’s 2007 analysis ‘Dropping of the edge’ or the 2009 report by Baum and Mitchell mapping geographic disadvantage in Australia. A table listing those areas is helpfully annexed to the recent publication Burkett, I, Place-based Impact Investment in Australia: A Literature Review Exploring Opportunities for place-based impact investment in Australia, Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations Canberra, April 2012, Appendix two.


Funding arrangements with government agencies are a constant and complex concern for the community sector. Myles McGregor-Lowndes and Amanda McBratney show how the Productivity Commmission has found some early answers that should not go on the backburner.

The Productivity Commission clearly established that all is not well with funding arrangements between governments and community service organisations (CSOs) and made some clear recommendations to address the problems.1 This significant issue has been overshadowed by the tussle about the structure and remit of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC) which will bring new registration and reporting requirements to most CSOs. The ACNC Implementation Taskforce is promising that reporting requirements, such as the Charity Passport, will reduce the overall reporting burden as the ACNC will act as a clearinghouse for government agencies’ information requirements, particularly in relation to funding-related paperwork.2 The federal Department of Finance and Deregulation and the Not-for-Profit Sector Reform Council have been consulting about new, streamlined standard conditions for small, low-risk grants, which can serve as a template for federal departments.

It is timely to return to the wider perspective offered by the Productivity Commission and what will be required to realise its vision for more appropriate funding relationships.

THE CSOS’ CONCERNSIn its research study on the not-for-profit sector in 2009, the Productivity Commission consulted CSOs widely, with roundtables, submissions and surveys. The concerns expressed were not new, and in its report, the Commission summarised them:

There is a strong perception in the sector that governments are not making the most of the knowledge and expertise of NFPs (not for profits) when formulating policies and designing programs.

•Many participants argued that, as a model of engagement, purchase of service contracting has some inherent weaknesses, including:

» creating incentives for community organisations to take on the practices and behaviours of the government agencies they deal with (or so-called ‘isomorphism’)

» distracting NFPs from their purpose thereby contributing to ‘mission drift’

» creating a perception in the community that NFPs are simply a delivery arm of government

» eroding the independence of NFPs in ways that make it difficult for them to remain responsive and flexible to community needs

» being inherently biased in favour of large organisations and thereby contributing to a loss of diversity in the sector.

•There were also concerns that where governments are using purchase of service contracting it is being poorly applied, including:

» the short-term nature of service agreements and contracts

» the inappropriate transfer of risk and associated costs

» tendering, contractual and reporting requirements that are disproportionate to the level of government funding and risk involved

» service agreements and contracts being used to micro manage the delivery of contracted services and probe into the management, operating methods and broader community activities of community organisations

» problems associated with the ‘lead agency’ or ‘lead provider’ funding model

» the sheer number of service agreements and contracts individual NFPs need to enter into in order to maintain the financial viability of their organisation.3

The literature on government–NFP community service contracting has been critical of its execution and the conclusion has been that it has generally fallen short of the desired outcome, supporting the general thrust of the CSOs’ concerns.4 However, the Productivity Commission found that government agencies had a very different perception of the state of the funding relationship.

Funding models: a realistic road ahead

1. Productivity Commission, Contribution of the Not-for-Profit Sector: Research Report, Productivity Commission, Melbourne, 2010, chapter 12, pp 297ff.

2. Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission Implementation Taskforce, Implementation Report, ACNC Implementation Taskforce, Melbourne, 2012, chapter 3.

3. Productivity Commission, n 1, pp 309–10.4. McGuire L and O’Neill D, ‘The Report on Government Services: A new piece in

the accountability matrix?’ in Barraket J (ed) Strategic Issues for the Not-for-Profit Sector,UNSW Press, Sydney, 2008, p 236; Nowland-Foreman G, ‘Purchase of service contracting, voluntary organizations and civil Society: dissecting the goose that lays the golden eggs?’, 1998, 42 American Behavioral Scientist 108.

036. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR MYLES MCGREGOR-LOWNDES AND AMANDA MCBRATNEY

Clearly, perceptions on the state of funding arrangements of the funders and the service

providers need to be synced. Robert Fitzgerald described the situation as

having community sector organisations and government agencies together

on a dance floor, with one group dancing to punk music and the

other waltzing.

THE GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS’ CONCERNSThe PC’s analysis of government agency submissions and a survey of federal and state agencies funding CSOs revealed that government agencies generally face increased public accountability demands where vulnerable and often voiceless beneficiaries are involved with outsourced services.5 Further, both state and federal governments are increasingly prompted by Auditors General and others to demonstrate and improve value for money in grant funding arrangements.6 Government agencies are increasingly using external bodies to deliver community services: Australian governments outlaid $25.5 billion in 2006–07,7 about 3.5 per cent of all general government sector payments.8 This is an increase of 152 per cent since 2000.9 The survey revealed no future intention to slow this growth, as such arrangements meant more flexible service delivery, the ability to package the funded services with other services, and value for money; and CSOs were closer to the clients

being targeted by the programs.10 The overwhelming majority of agencies viewed their relationship with CSOs as one of ‘partnership’, were taking steps to address at least some of the sector’s concerns and were engaging in both sector-level initiatives (for example, compacts) and individual capacity building, trialling innovative approaches to monitoring, evaluation, accountability and risk management.11

Clearly, perceptions of the funders and the service providers need to be synced. Robert Fitzgerald, Commissioner overseeing the research study, described the situation as having CSOs and government agencies together on a dance floor, with one group dancing to punk music and the other waltzing.

WHAT IS TO BE DONE?The Commission noted the apparently contrary perceptions but hinted that the truth was probably somewhere between the two and could only be uncovered by significant research, which was beyond the scope of its terms of reference.12 This did not prevent it making a series of recommendations to improve the situation.

Firstly, the Commission recommended that government agencies examine the model of their engagement with CSOs, to ensure the best fit for the circumstances, rather than fitting one purchasing model to all. Where a competitive purchase of service market exists, client-directed service delivery models are preferred, provided appropriate protections for vulnerable clients are in place. Where this is not feasible or appropriate, other models, such as short-term joint ventures, working through a single lead agency, extended long-term or rolling funding, should be pursued, after involving all parties in design and regular evaluation and review. It was apparent that less suitable models of engagement contribute to less efficient and less effective outcomes.

5. Productivity Commission, n 1, p 303.6. Commonwealth Auditor-General, Direct Source Procurement, Audit Report No 11,

2010–2011, Performance Audit,ANAO, 2010; Grant P, Strategic review of the administration of Australian Government grant programs: Report 1 (Department of Finance and Deregulation, Canberra, 2008) http://www.finance.gov.au/publications/strategic-reviews/grants.html, viewed 1 August 2012.

7. Productivity Commission, n 1, p 72.8. Kelly J, Strategic review of the administration of Australian Government grant programs:

Report 2, (Department of Finance and Deregulation, Canberra, 2008) http://www.finance.gov.au/publications/strategic-reviews/grants.html, viewed 15 March 2012.

9. Australian Bureau of Statistics, Australian National Accounts: Non-profit Institutions Satellite Account, Catalogue No. 5256.0 (ABS, Canberra, 2009).

10. Productivity Commission, n 1, Appendix D, d1.11. Productivity Commission, n 1, Appendix D, d1 and 311, box 12.3.12. Productivity Commission, n 1, 312.


The Commission made a particular issue of the length of contract periods, which should not be based on an electoral cycle, but the time required to achieve the agreed outcomes. For contracts that were extended life service agreements, processes for periodic review and alteration needed to be developed.

In the Commission’s view, risk management and the incidence of liability required new protocols, reflecting which party was able to bear the risk. This should be located in an explicit risk management framework and would likely result in government agencies no longer seeking broad-ranging legal indemnities and imposing unrealistic insurance requirements upon CSOs.

One significant recommendation was that the Department of Finance and Deregulation ‘should develop core principles to underpin all government service agreements and contracts in the human services area’.13 This is far broader than devising a new agreement for low risk projects. In its discussion leading up to this recommendation the Commission noted that:

Governments are often perceived to be imposing ‘unfair’ terms and conditions that would not be considered appropriate or acceptable in dealing with for-profit providers. Of particular concern to many NFPs is the extent to which contracts allow governments to unilaterally vary or terminate contracts and service agreements with very little notice and which limit the ability of service providers to seek compensation.14

While the Productivity Commission said contracts should be based on ’fair and reasonable terms and conditions’, it did not spell out a measure of what was fair and reasonable.15 A submission to the Commission (to which it referred positively) did suggest among other issues that the principles could be drawn from the Australian Consumer Law (ACL),16 which was enacted in part to remedy the use of onerous standard form contracts by businesses contracting with consumers.17

The Productivity Commission’s recommendations are good first steps in resolving the evident problems surrounding funding arrangements for CSOs. They should not be lost from the agenda as work goes into establishing the ACNC and the charity passport information system. Too often, government agencies turn such recommendations into a discourse which shifts the problem back to CSOs. The Productivity Commission’s proposals clearly require government agencies to examine their own processes and structures. They need to get on with the task.

Prof Myles McGregor-Lowndes is Director of the Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies at the Queensland University of Technology. Dr Amanda McBratney is Senior Lecturer in the School of Accountancy at the Queensland University of Technology.

13. Recommendation 12.8, Productivity Commission, n 2, pp LII, pp 340–44.14. Productivity Commission, n 2, p 341.15. Productivity Commission, n 2, p 343.16. The ACL was enacted as Schedule 2 of the Trade Practices Act 1974 (Cth) in April 2010:

Trade Practices Amendment (Australian Consumer Law) (No. 2) Act 2010 (Cth), Sched 6. The Act was also renamed the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth).

17. Public Interest Advocacy Centre and Whitlam Institute, “A Question of Balance”, Submission 159, Productivity Commission Inquiry into the Contribution of the Not-for-Profit Sector (PIAC, Sydney, 2009) p 67.


Grow your skills as a professional in the community sectorWant to accelerate your career, strengthen your management capabilities, or fortify your credentials as a specialist in the community sector? Whatever your objective, QUT’s industry-recognised Graduate Certificate or Master of Business (Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies) is a great investment in your future.

The Graduate Certificate provides you with the foundations for high quality study and professional practice, and is available across Australia via flexible delivery.

The Master of Business builds on the Graduate Certificate and can be tailored to meet your particular interests with opportunities to pursue specialist topics and practical work-related projects.

Financial support may be available. The ACPNS Scholarship and Travel Grant Scheme and the ACPNS Alumni Chapter’s Book Bursary assists Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies students with tuition fees and the costs of attending the orientation, intensive program sessions and with the purchase of text books.

For further information, contact Professor Myles McGregor-Lowndes, The Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies, on (07) 3138 1020, email [email protected] or visit www.qut.edu.au/business/acpns

CRICOS No. 00213J 18928 BUS–12-1045

togetherWorking

1. Norton, M, The Queensland Community Services Sector 2010, Work Futures P/L, commissioned by QCOSS, 2010

The Queensland Community Services Futures Forum agreed in March 2011 to develop a ‘Green Paper’ on how the community sector could work better together in the face of significant state and national change. Its author Trevor Carlyon details the results.

Green Paper language is typically that of government, designed to stimulate debate without any commitment to action. In this case, we determined that Working Together: A Green Paper, published for the 2012 Queensland Community Services Futures Forum, would stimulate debate on how the community sector can take leadership through collaboration as it responds to the tectonic shifts in policy, product and purchasing that we have seen at state and national levels in recent years.

This, we decided, would involve:

•Shifting the discussion from organisational size to organisational behaviour (see breakout).

•Examining both enablers and blockers to more effective collaboration.

•Examining best practice around consortium/partnership/collaboration models and a potential move from ‘lead agency’ to ‘facilitative leadership’ models.

•Placing the paper in the context of recent efforts to better define the relationship between the sector and government and providing a framework for sector development and investment.

Themes in the paper and outlined below were derived from interviews with purchasers and providers of community services as well as research academics and senior policy officers.

‘Services run by small agencies are not ipso facto better than services run by large agencies or vice versa. Large agencies have to guard against being too internally focused, but so too can smaller agencies become insular and inward looking. UnitingCare believes it is important that we consider how we want to ‘be‘ as organisations and how we ‘behave‘ as a sector. The character of organisations is probably a far more important matter to debate and concern ourselves with than size alone. It is ultimately our organisational behaviour that will determine our capacity to work together for better client and community outcomes.’

Anne Cross, Chief Executive Officer of UnitingCare Queensland, during the ‘Does size matter?’ conversation at the 2009 Queensland Council of Social Service (QCOSS) Conference which, with the emerging evidence of collaborative success in place-based initiatives, influenced the shift in focus from organisational size to organisational behaviour.

Drivers of change

There are over 2,200 non-government businesses conducting community services activities in over 5,000 locations in Queensland. The sector employs more than 100,000 workers and has total receipts of more than $5.3 billion. In valuing the sector, Marion Norton observes1:

‘There is a risk that economic drivers will drown out the goals and strategic intent that are really the most important, and are fundamental to the organisations that were established to serve people needing help’ .

Over recent decades a number of drivers have reshaped the community sector, including:

•exponential increases in government expenditure for a wide range of services

•rising expectations for public accountability

•a significant shift of risk to the sector

•more complex compliance and regulation

•greater expectations of organisational performance, and

•the adoption by government of a market place ideology.

040. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR TREVOR CARLYON

Accountability for public funds, meeting or exceeding quality standards, and managing workplace legislative impacts has required investment in more sophisticated information management and finance systems by both purchaser and provider. In some cases, organisations have grown in scale to defray costs and allow investment. In others, they have closed down or been forced to amalgamate. Many large agencies have been formed by the aggregation of previously separate entities to manage both financial and performance risks. The creation of large church-based agencies is a good example of this drive to scale; access to capital, a much-ignored strategic issue in the sector, then also becomes a major factor.

In this environment it is likely that the more regulated, capital-intense, technology-dependant, innately-risky, large-scale a particular service type becomes, the more likely that purchasers will prefer bigger organisations. Large organisations have a different kind of resilience in the face of rapid change and can redeploy resources as well as demonstrate management and systems capacity to build these services.

The more successful the sector is in convincing governments that certain types of services should be available routinely in all communities the more likely it is that governments will seek to partner with a smaller number of providers to roll out services that meet criteria for timeliness, quality, risk management, value for money and access.

Depending on the service stream that government is considering, the influence of the three Ps (product, price and value proposition) of market place ideology will vary in importance – they will however always be a consideration, as will ‘back office’ policies related to efficient and effective contract management. The imperative for government to streamline business processes can drive the desire for fewer providers with complementary systems, competencies and capacities, allowing the purchaser to align, collapse and rationalise contractual arrangements.

Both state and federal government are indicating that increasingly the sector will need to:

•identify and articulate the benefits of their services (social value proposition)

•demonstrate their capacity for innovation development

•identify and explain the cost drivers in their organisation

•offer evidence of workforce and business development (assessed capability)

•demonstrate a commitment to measurable productivity in service delivery outcomes and overall organisational performance

•embrace mutuality as a principle to guide development of the market and the tools and knowledge to skill the industry.

Transfer of risk to our sector and its management has certainly captured the attention of some organisations and their governance structures but it remains relatively unexplored as a significant driver of change in our sector. Capacity to manage, mitigate, avoid or even transfer risk has a bearing on an organisation’s reputation as well as its insurance and other operational costs. This area of our operations has great capacity to challenge service values, practitioner practice frameworks and organisational capacity and competence. It is an area that also lends itself to better outcomes through collaboration to share risk.

These changes have seen the emergence of for-profit providers and other agencies with business models that differ from the traditional non-government organisation (NGO). They also come amid a ‘perfect storm’ of issues that could significantly erode the long-term viability and diversity of service delivery in the sector – including ‘fair pay’ implementation, the impact of the carbon price, rises to superannuation contributions and workforce issues. Issues loom even harder for services in rural and regional services.

Does collaboration improve impact, innovation and productivity?

A 2008 assessment of high impact NFPs in the United States provides an insight into the strategic thinking of those organisations. The secret to their success lay in mobilising every sector of society – government, business, non-profits, and the public – to be a ‘force for good’; that is, their success was more to do with how they worked outside their organisations than with how they managed their own internal operations. They:

•bridged the divide between service and advocacy

•found ways to work with markets and to help companies ‘do good while doing well’

•built strong communities of supporters

•helped their peers succeed, building networks of no-profit allies, with which they freely shared wealth, expertise, talent and power

•combined creativity (and innovation) with disciplined systems to evaluate, execute and adapt ideas over time

•cultivated a strong second-in-command, built enduring executive teams, and developed large and powerful boards.


Does collaboration benefit clients?

The Nous Group not-for-profit benchmarks project (see p.43) showed that collaborative efforts to bring down back-of-house costs and reduce administrative burden can free up significant resources. Most important to recognise, however, is that reporting obligations to funders account for 60 per cent of organisations’ compliance burden, which is primarily borne by service delivery staff. Other studies also show benefits, but reinforce that collaborative ventures are not easy, are highly dependent on context and do not always follow the same path to success.

Are there mechanisms for across-sector collaboration?

As a sector, we have not taken up the concept of ‘industry’ to define our scope, yet we have enough scale and community benefit to be recognised as a large set of complex businesses that make up a service industry. That recognition could tap into industry development facilities and develop an appetite for sector-led reform that can be far more effective than purchaser-driven approaches to resolving under-performance.

What is the opportunity?

The sector has a long history of collective impact – working closely together to achieve large scale social reform or to deal with a direct threat to its existence. The current and emerging challenges for the sector are an opportunity to forge new cross sector (industry) alliances that improve service delivery and agency partnerships that address sustainability and productivity.

This is sector-led reform. It may require new structures but fundamentally it requires the sector to provide the reform agenda and plan to government.

Figure 1 shows how activities at industry, agency and community levels can be aligned with each other and with existing projects designed to improve capability and capacity.

The big questions the Green Paper posed are:

1. Are the threats to sustainability and diversity in our industry compelling enough to create an appetite for sector-led reform built on collaborative solutions?

2. Is there acceptance that collaboration, innovation and productivity are linked and that these attributes directly benefit clients/consumers/organisations/community?

3. Will leadership come from the Futures Forum/QCOSS or a different alliance that has an industry rather than a sector approach?

4. Will the resources for strategic restructuring and alliance building be sourced from the existing committed agencies and new partners or should government always be regarded as the default funder?

In response to those questions, we are building a business case and compelling argument for the establishment of an independent Queensland Community Services Industry body that would provide strategic leadership in sector development, regulatory reform, structural adjustment, sustainability and productivity. It is expected that this body would engage with other industry bodies in a timely and strategic manner around major infrastructure development and planning as well as providing government with long-term solutions.

Watch this space.

Trevor Carlyon is a consultant, based in Queensland. This article is an edited extract of his paper: Working Together: A Green Paper, published for the 2012 Queensland Community Services Future Forum.

productivity issues

industry development

capacity building

regulation

restructuring

partnerships

sustainability

innovation

no-competitive- advantage sharing

client outcome focus

local need=local collaborations

flexible partnerships

place-based approaches

resource re-allocations

INDUSTRY

AGENCY

COMMUNITY

Figure 1


Comparing co$ts through collaborationA group of Victorian community sector organisations are breaking new ground in collaboration by sharing sensitive information on costs to find better ways to manage back-of-office functions. MacKillop Family Services Chief Executive Micaela Cronin outlines the process and promise.

Like most operations, the community sector knows that we could deliver better services if we can streamline our work and free up staff to spend more time helping clients and less time dealing with cumbersome back-of-house functions. But there are few meaningful internal or industry benchmarks in the not-for-profit (NFP) sector against which costs and quality can be accurately measured and improved, so it’s been difficult to find a starting point.

Three years ago a group of 13 not-for-profit (NFP) agencies in Victoria, led by MacKillop Family Services, came together to consider how we could address some of these shared issues. We were interested in comparing the cost and quality of back-of-house functions and ways to improve their performance and, importantly, to share our findings beyond the group for the benefit of the wider sector.

Working with the Nous group, we agreed to benchmark six administrative and support services:

•information and communications technology (ICT)

•compliance

•human resources (including training)

•finance

•fleet

•payroll

Initial data was collected in 2011 and will be harvested in greater detail again in 2012 and 2013 to track and measure improvements.

The willingness of organisations to share sensitive information is a stand-out feature of this project. Organisations – again not only in the NFP sector – can be reluctant to share information about costs and operations that could impact on their

competitive tendering. It can feel like an unnecessary risk to expose your operations to outside scrutiny, particularly when they are in areas that you feel can be improved. However each organisation has made a major commitment to the project, workshopping together to set and provide data against the selected key performance indicators (KPIs) – an exercise described by participating staff as one of the most valuable aspects of the research. The project has given corporate support managers the chance to network and allowed people from a range of back-of-house roles to share their experiences for the first time with others in similar roles.

Each organisation is getting a picture of the cost and quality of their back-of-house services, compared with others, as well as the opportunity to implement good practice strategies and undergo annual assessment. Each has met with the researchers to separately review findings and identify strengths and opportunities, and participated in group workshops to share good practice.

In July, early findings were collated and released in summary. They come with caveats about their initial limitations – it was not possible in the first year to collect consistent data across all organisations. Our initial focus was to develop and agree on the KPIs, to allow for robust data in the years ahead, and to be sure we are testing the information in the most valuable way.

That in itself has been an important process, and one that has also delivered insights into some of the issues we need to consider – from who we ask in an organisation about a particular function to how we can best deliver comparisons between very diverse organisations, which range in staff numbers from 80 to 800 and revenue from under $10 million up to $100 million. We also had to think about the reason we were doing this work. Therefore some preliminary figures were estimated, with staff instructed not to spend too much time gathering data in the first instance – as this in itself further reduced their capacity to deliver quality services. Our aim was to find the best ways to collect the data, without further impacting on performance.

Organisations can be reluctant to share

information about costs and operations

that could impact on their competitive

tendering.

043. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR MICAELA CRONIN

More detail is provided in the public summary report1 however the early data showed:

Payroll •The cost of payroll services did not vary significantly across ‘typical’ organisations (the middle 50 per cent).

•Organisations with lower payroll costs often had economies of scale through larger pay-runs, simpler payrolls (that is, fewer casual and roster staff) or efficient staff and processes.

•In one case, unsuitable outsourcing arrangements resulted in payroll costs that were almost three times the average.

Finance •On average, boards were more satisfied with the finance function than management teams.

•Few economies of scale were seen as organisation size increased, possibly because these efficiencies were offset by more rigorous financial controls in some larger organisations.

Human resources (HR) •The majority of investment in HR was directed towards staff training (42 per cent) and recruitment (24 per cent).

•Staff turnover averaged 16 per cent and organisations with high turnover often had higher training and recruitment costs.

Fleet •Organisations with lower fleet costs generally chose smaller cars and ensured fleet size was kept to a minimum.

Information and communications technology (ICT)

•Staff were only ‘slightly satisfied’ on average with ICT services, even though the ICT received the largest proportion of funds per FTE.

In addition to the five traditional back-of-house services, the burden of compliance was also measured. Reporting obligations to funders was the most significant activity, accounting for 60 per cent of compliance work. It is worth noting that, similar to other back-of-house functions benchmarked in this project, compliance is often considered an overhead. Unlike the others, however, much of the compliance burden is borne by program delivery staff rather than a ‘business services’ team.

We look forward to the next two years of data collection – which will reflect many ‘best practice’ changes being made to back-of-house operations and the value they deliver – and to sharing those findings in detail with the whole sector.

Each organisation is getting a picture of the cost and quality of their back-of-house services, compared

with others, as well as the opportunity to implement good practice strategies

and undergo annual assessment.

PARTICIPATING AGENCIES

MacKillop Family Services Anglicare Berry Street Brotherhood of St Laurence Children’s and Family Services (CAFS) Connections Hanover Jesuit Social Services Melbourne Citymission Uniting Care Orana Relationships Australia Victoria St Luke’s Windermere

SUPPORTERS

Principal: Helen Macpherson Smith Trust Myer Foundation Jack Brockhoff Foundation Ian Potter Foundation Victorian Council of Social Services (VCOSS) Office of Community Sector Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare

The project was completed with assistance from Nous Group’s Community Contribution Fund.

1. Nous Group, Not-for-profit back-of-house function benchmarks 2010-11, Public summary report, available at http://www.nfpbenchmarking.com.au/


1. The Federal Government’s ‘Stronger Futures’ policy extended the Northern Territory ‘intervention’ in Aboriginal communities by 10 years, and imposed income management for people on social security payments to five trial sites outside the Territory. See story by David Tennant on px

Sense of struggle, need for hopeIn being true to mission, St Vincent de Paul Chief Executive Dr John Falzon argues that the community sector should expect much from government – and also from ourselves.

Recently, I participated in a roundtable discussion on how we might tell the story of an alternative vision of society. The voices in the room were strong and honest. They touched me deeply for they carried with them both the metallic sharpness of painful and oppressive realities as well as the liberating sound of the sea.

Civil society in Australia is only as strong as its connectedness with the people; only inasmuch as its organisations and networks are vehicles for solidarity and social change.

Civil society organisations are often judged in the short term on their ability to pull in the funding and to gain a profile as serious players. The longer view of history, however, will provide a very different lens through which an evaluation can be made. I would suggest that the civil society organisations of a given period of history will be judged by their usefulness as vehicles for progressive social change. Neither fidelity to mission nor success in the marketplace will matter as much, in the end, as the historical contribution to the project of social change for social justice. In fact, while the mission of individual organisations will be analysed in relation to the concrete conditions of the time, the more interesting picture will emerge with an analysis of civil society as a whole, including of course its many contradictions.

Civil society organisations are historically central to many of the most powerful movements for progressive social reform and radical change. All of the most significant reforms in Australia’s social history have come from below, from the efforts of people on the ground under the guiding stars of struggle and hope. The rights of the people in the workplace, such as health and safety, wage justice, workers’ compensation, were won by the people who were best qualified

to analyse the realities and propose solutions. The rights of women, for example in the areas of domestic violence, the public provision of refuges for women and children, and sex discrimination likewise. The rights of the First Peoples of Australia likewise again.

In fact I would argue that the unresolved contradictions of invasion and colonisation in the heart of Australia’s history are, and will continue to be, the motor for the most significant social change in the direction of social justice. Put another way, we will not move forward as a nation until we properly resolve these contradictions. The cruel and tragic episodes in our history such as the Stolen Generations and now Stronger Futures1 (more accurately referred to as Stolen Futures), are merely attempts to manage these contradictions from above rather than engaging with them from below.

When civil society organisations move into a historical phase of institutionalisation and, some would argue, ossification, they risk losing their immediate sense of struggle and need for hope.

Without the sense of struggle and the need for hope we might be highly competent instruments of service delivery but we will not be organically connected with the people. We will usually be able to act as excellent vehicles for fundraising and volunteerism – both positive functions that allow others to contribute to building a better society. The contradiction that we ignore at our peril, however, is the fact that both of these functions are also means by which services can be delivered at a lower cost to government and, therefore, with a lower dependence on the taxation system.

Without the sense of struggle and the need for hope we can fall into the trap of finding out what government is looking for and what its ideological agenda is, asking for it and then gleefully congratulating ourselves on the victory when we get it, especially if it involves the tantalising offer of funding to carry out the very thing that government wanted all along!

045. INSIGHT 7SUSTAINABLE SECTOR DR JOHN FALZON

This is a far cry from using our potential to question the structures that dispossess and disempower. This is also a far cry from using our potential to engage in the seminal struggle for a redistribution of wealth and power. As Frantz Fanon, the great psychiatrist and theorist of the dehumanising effects of colonisation, put it so well:

What counts today, the question which is looming on the horizon, is the need

for a redistribution of wealth. Humanity must reply to this question, or be shaken

to pieces by it.

If wealth is correctly understood here as access to appropriate housing, health, education, transport, employment, social security and spiritual wholeness, I would simply add that, in order to achieve this, there must first be a massive redistribution of hope.

Civil society organisations can, of course, be complicit in social control in the interests of the powerful. This has been demonstrated historically with our role in developing and implementing the categories of ‘deserving’ and ‘undeserving’ poor.

This instrumentality continues to occur today, especially when a genuine analysis of the structural causes of exclusion is eschewed in favour of a neoliberal invocation of blaming the excluded for their own exclusion.

The contradiction lies within civil society organisations, however, that we have also been a thorn in the side of those who exercise this social control. Everything is pregnant with its contrary!

We live in a time of the politics of cruelty; a time that cries out for a politics of hope.

We are all familiar with the term ‘charitable organisations’. We are also all familiar with the term ‘faith-based organisations’ as a descriptor of a particular subset of civil society. I would like to put to you that we need to identify a new configuration: the emergence of ‘hope-based’ organisations and movements.

Before we can share the common dreams of a fair and just Australia we need to share the common nightmares of those who have been left out or pushed out.

Paternalistic programs will not solve the root causes of poverty and exclusion in our country.

Neither is charity the answer to these problems. Charity has come to be understood as an essential ingredient in a modern market economy in order to catch the people who fall ‘through the cracks’.

Charity is no substitute for justice.

We must put an end to the creation of gaping holes rather than merely supplying stretchers for the people who fall through them.

It is justice’s role to build the kind of society where everyone is truly included and no one is pushed to the margins.

Our organisations, big and small, are important as we seek to shape a more just and compassionate Australian society. I wish to put to you, however, that we now need to reconceptualise ourselves as a movement for social change, for social transformation.

We should expect much from government. But we should also expect much from ourselves, not in the sense of letting government off the hook and abrogating its responsibilities to the people, but in the sense of being a space in which the people can really speak and be heard, a massive roundtable if you like, but also a powerful movement.

People right across the community are searching for the meaning of life in society. There is a greater tendency towards accentuating the common good rather than individual need or greed. The experience of alienation has as its flipside the desire for meaningful inclusion and participation. The social and community sector is uniquely placed in relation to this.

When civil society organisations move

into a historical phase of institutionalisation

and, some would argue, ossification, they risk losing their immediate sense of struggle and

need for hope.


One of the great lessons of the Global Financial Crisis was the overt nature of the interconnectedness of things. This is something that those of us who have chosen to analyse the world ‘from below’ have long known. This is despite the myths perpetrated by those who impose a world-view from above; those who have long peddled the view that individuals are largely to blame for their own exclusion and, conversely, that the accumulation of great wealth is primarily a fair result of individual effort.

We are close to the ground. In the midst of relative prosperity we constantly see the Australian face of poverty and exclusion. We are touched personally by stories of marginalisation. There’s nothing particularly ingenious about our ability to join the dots, to see the bigger picture as we encounter the many personal stories. We are well trained in the art of questioning how things are connected; of refusing to accept the status quo when we know that everything is open to change; of going deeper than the appearance of things.

We should never be surprised by the booms and crises that characterise the current economic system. But change is just as certain as the crisis. The nature of the change, however, is up for grabs. We must guard against attempts to consolidate the priorities that have led to so much exclusion and disempowerment.

Our challenge is to refuse the overtures of instrumentality; the attempts to co-opt us in order to work towards preserving an unjust status quo. We refuse, for example, the false division between the ‘the unemployed’ (code for ‘those who are to blame’) and ‘those who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own’. A system that continues to engage in a form of new paternalism with punitive drivers will never be

socially just or socially inclusive. All progressive social change has been won through the hard work of those who believed that another kind of society is possible. This approach is neither paternalistic nor coercive. It is best summed up in the powerful words of Lilla Watson and the group of Aboriginal activists she was part of in Brisbane in the 1970s:

If you have come to help me you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with

mine, then let us work together.

The time of crisis places on us an obligation to ensure that the stories from below are not unspoken or untold; that the people we stand in solidarity with are not silenced; that we are not silenced.

Australia stands near the bottom of the list of relative social expenditures in comparison with countries in the European Union. It is time for us to put our money where our mouth is. To conceptualise the time of crisis as a time for creative social change is to make the best use of all that is favourable to social justice.

During the period of prosperity we saw the dismantling of social protections along with the attempted destruction of the strong sense of the collective. Now is the time to reassert our interconnectedness; that strong sense of unity in a common cause; to see ourselves as part of a progressive movement for social change. In the words of the poem, “Unity” by Pablo Neruda:

I am surrounded by just one thing, a single movement.

Dr John Falzon is Chief Executive of the St Vincent de Paul Society National Council and a member of the Australian Social Inclusion Board.


insight 07: sustainable sector - changes and challenges

Documents

social inclusion014

australian housing

australian centre

paul society national

monash university

vcoss accessible format

uk social exclusion

deputy chief executive