Senscot Conference/AGM

Geof Cox spoke at the recent Senscot Conference/AGM on Is social enterprise really changing the world – or being changed by it? - you can read his further reflections on the event here.

Senscot is a network of Scottish social entrepreneurs working for 'a socially just Scotland' - by trying to make social enterprise 'a valued part of everyday life'.

(There is unfortunately no equivalent of Senscot in the UK as a whole.  I've had some great feedback from my guest blogs in The Guardian Online, but it wasn't until one of them was picked up and reposted by the Senscot Bulletin that the reaction became truly global.  I received an email from my old friend Gonzalo San Martin who now manages NESsT's Latin American operations.  Gonzalo lives in Santiago in Chile - I worked with him in Ulaan Baatar in Outer Mongolia - and he picked up the Senscot Bulletin in Oslo, Norway.  You too can go global and subscribe to the Senscot Bulletin here.)

 

The Future of Everything

 

The future of everything...

Geof Cox was the final speaker at this year's Future of Everything Conference, 12^th-13^th May at Four Piccadilly Place in the heart of Manchester.

The Conference is the 'ideas' aspect of the 5 day Festival of Art, Music & Culture 11th-14th May.

Geof Cox spoke on Social Enterprise & Open Source Culture and initiated exploration of the way emergent online ‘peer production’ and ‘collaborative consumption’ business models – and especially those arising out of open source approaches to intellectual property – relate to the burgeoning social enterprise movement.

 

miEnterprise in the news again...

The miEnterprise project is featured in the latest Department for Business Innovation & Skills Strategy Document.  Here's what they say about us:

miEnterprise is a ground-breaking social enterprise working directly with socially disadvantaged unemployed people, particularly those with learning disabilities, to help them establish and develop micro businesses.  Developed as a joint-venture marketing co-operative in close partnership with Herefordshire Council, Jobcentre Plus and HMRC, miEnterprise offers a membership scheme, which provides comprehensive business support tailored to overcome disadvantages faced in gaining employment.  Individuals use personal budgets to purchase scheme membership.  This provides personalised support geared to developing a range of entrepreneurial skills and competencies in a real-life work environment, mostly in their own community.  There is evidence that miEnterprise members learn best when learning is individualised, applied and directly related to their business venture.  This kind of supported self-employment offers a real option for many disadvantaged people to work towards becoming less dependent on traditional and often costly social care services.

You can download the document, Skills for Sustainable Growth, here.

 

miEnterprise wins National Market Towns Award...

We were all amazed recently that the government changed the law specifically to enable the miEnterprise project to be a provider of Supported Permitted Work.  Now miEnterprise has won the prestigious National Market Town Awards. The Action for Market Towns Press Release lauded miEnterprise as "the first social enterprise of its type nationally to help people plan, set-up, run and develop micro-businesses as a flexible route into employment - now, with support from Vince Cable’s Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, miEnterprise is helping to set up similar organisations in towns and cities throughout the country. Jon Pitts of miEnterprise, receives the award from Lorraine Connolly, head of the Community Newswire at the Press Association, and Catherine Hammant, Chairman of Action for Market Towns

The Press Release goes on to explain:

The National Market Town Awards celebrate innovative projects in small towns throughout England... Projects first competed to be named winner of their region and the eight regional winners then went head-to-head in the contest to win the National Market Town Award. The awards are organized by Action for Market Towns, the national charity which supports the renewal and vitality of small towns.

People disadvantaged in the labour market, often through disability or for health reasons, find it difficult to raise finance to start their own businesses. miEnterprise offers  supported employment  in a way which gives its members effective business support without affecting their self-employed status. It has set up workplaces, including a fully-equipped catering kitchen, which are available to members to hire, supporting  the development of high-quality micro-businesses.

Jon Pitts said:

“This is hugely important for us and our members, particularly because it is not a social care award, but an award for regeneration and supporting the local economy.  miEnterprise provides a lot of opportunities for people to start their own businesses and it is important that people with disability or disadvantage can contribute to their local economy.  We are now looking to roll out the project to 10 other towns, starting with North Tyneside and Leicester City.”

 

miEnterprise changes the law...

The miEnterprise project is going from strength to strength. This new model for supported self-employment was developed by Jon Pitts and Geof Cox, and has been piloted by Jon with Herefordshire Social Services over the last 2 years, proving that micro-enterprise can offer a better way forward than conventional employment for many people with learning disabilities.

The government is now directly funding 'beta-testing' of the model in further Getting a Life sites throughout the UK. Not only that - they have actually changed the law so that miEnterprise - and other Community Interest Companies - can now be providers of Supported Permitted Work.

Supported Permitted Work enables disabled people to undertake paid work (earning up to £92 per week) while still receiving welfare benefits such as Incapacity Benefit and Employment and Support Allowance, as long as their work is supported and supervised by an appropriate Supported Permitted Work provider. Unfortunately the regulations were drafted before Community Interest Companies were developed, and currently specify that providers must be public or voluntary sector bodies. miEnterprise, for many reasons, felt that the Community Interest Company form provided the best organisational structure, and has worked closely with Job Centre Plus to extend the definition of Supported Permitted Work providers to include Community Interest Companies. The law was changed by Statutory Instrument No. 840 (The Social Security (Miscellaneous Amendments) (No. 3) Regulations 2010), which will come into force on 28th June 2010.

STOP PRESS... We're now working through The Common Cause Foundation with Lippy People on a further replication of the miEnterprise model - to people in the criminal justice system who can't find employment, but can set up their own social enterprises...

 

 

 

New CIC dividend and interest caps...

Following the recent consultation on the Community Interest Company dividend and interest caps the Regulator has announced her intention to relax and simplify the regulatory framework from April 2010. The essential points are:

• new rules will apply to shares or debt issued after 6th April this year (but will not affect shares or loans taken out before this date, to which the old rules will apply)
• the maximum aggregated cap on share dividends (the maximum percentage of all profits that can be paid out other than to asset locked bodies or for community benefit) will remain unchanged at 35% - this is still seen as essential to preserve the focus on social over financial returns
• both the per share and the interest caps will be decoupled from Base Lending Rate, both to simplify their operation and in recognition of the fact that Base Rate itself no longer really reflects the actual cost of investment
• the share dividend cap from April will be 20 percent of the paid up value of a share
• the interest cap will be 10 percent (calculated on the average amount of a community interest company’s debt, or sum outstanding under a debenture issued by it, during the 12 month period immediately preceding the date on which the interest on that debt or debenture becomes due)
• the Regulator has emphasised that these are maximum limits subject to further review in 2-3 years time: it is important that unlike the old caps they do not come to be seen as normative, and that in general returns are kept well below these maximum levels.

For the full announcement go here; for the CIC Association's dialogue go here.

 

 

Who are Geof Cox Associates working with NOW...

Can this waste paper bin really be made from old plastic bags by some of the world's poorest people? You betcha!Wonderful new social enterprise Funky Junk Recycled have just asked us for advice on issuing CIC Shares.

Funky Junk was started by ethical tourism company Carpe Diem Travel. Coincidentally People & Places – Ethical Volunteering - the latest initiative of Ethical & Responsible Tourism Guru Harold Goodwin – is also looking at the CIC Share form.

 

Sometimes the recent explosive growth of social enterprise in areas like fair trade, the environment, health and social care seems to overshadow the long history, importance and impact of organisations that trade for cultural and educational purposes. Among other work with cultural and educational bodies, we are currently helping Tyne & Wear Museums reach more diverse and disadvantaged people, and revisioning the exemplary Discovery Museum in Newcastle.

We're partnering the new Institute for Voluntary Action Research and others in the latest Joseph Rowntree Foundation research project on asset based community development.

We're helping staff at Chester-le-Street CVS do their own social enterprise company formations - and we're working with FINE to provide mentoring to CVSs and other voluntary sector umbrella bodies in the North East of England on how to support social enterprise development more generally.

We're helping Amazonails - the leading strawbale builder in the UK – improve their governance.

Current organisational structures and restructuring work includes:

• Stars in the Sky Yorkshire – a friendships agency for people with learning disabilities
• World of Fitness - community gyms in Leeds
• SES – a social enterprise development agency in North East England

The Childcare People have won the South Tyneside most promising new business award – that's not just 'most promising social enterprise' – but most promising of ANY business!

We're also working with the West Mercia Probabtion Service, Dave Tomalin, and a number of other partners on social enterprise for prisoners and ex-offenders, and of course with a number of NHS externalisations and other social enterprise initiatives in health and social care.

Oh - and advising Oxfam in Russia on social enterprise development of course!

 

Egidijus Biknevičius of Etalink - also a former president of the Lithuanian union of blind innovatorsSTOP PRESS... We've just heard that one of the participants in our Lithuania training programme, Egidijus Biknevičius, won the Lithuanian national 2008 Young Entrepreneur Medal of Merit for Business for his work establishing the ICT social enterpise Etalink (for a passable translation google 'Etalink' and select 'translate this page' for the top result).

 

 

 

 

New publications from Geof Cox...

Geof Cox has written a 'warts and all' study of the Social Firm model for Research in Practice for Adults. RIPFA works to promote evidence-based commissioning in adult social care, and is part of the Dartington group - an international centre for the generation and application of new ideas - many of which are central to social enterprise. The new Social Firms study is part of the Key Issues series, which addresses topics where the evidence-base is currently under-developed, but where practitioners and managers still need to access objective information to help inform their practice. The series also includes guides to outcome based commissioning, support brokerage, and joint strategic needs assessment. All of these can be downloaded free here.

 

Geof Cox has also writen the social enterprise sections of the latest FINE induction pack First Steps for a New Funding Advice Worker - more details here.

 

 

 

 

 

Royal Society of Arts...

Over 2008 a number of key social enterprise people - including Sally Reynolds, Rob Greenland and Geof Cox - were elected Fellows of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA). The RSA is one of the old London Learned Societies. It was founded in 1754, helped establish both the Royal Academy of Arts and the Royal College of Music, and has numbered among its Fellows leading social thinkers - including both Adam Smith and Karl Marx - as well as leading arts figures such as William Hogarth and Charles Dickens.

According to Wikipedia,

Notwithstanding its establishment credentials, the RSA has always been a radical body which has sought to challenge the status quo and change the world around it "to remove the barriers to social progress". Its founders spoke of the need to "embolden enterprise, enlarge science, refine art, improve our manufactures and extend our commerce", but also of the need to alleviate poverty and secure full employment.

The potential synergy between the RSA and social enterprise is apparent from this description, and the fact that people from social enterprise are being elected as Fellows is evidence that social enterprise is now important as both a radical and a mainstream movement.

 

Guy Rotherham Award - 2008 Winner...

STIMATS - the South Tyneside Intermediate Musculoskeletal Assessment and Treatment Service - won the 2008 Guy Rotherham Award from the Improvement Foundation. The new model service is currently part of South Tyneside Primary Care Trust, but Geof Cox Associates are assisting its establishment as an independent social enterprise, under the name of Accedo Health Community Interest Company.

 

 

 

 

2008 - Social Enterprise Conference in Russia...

Geof Cox at the Ostashkov Conference. Oxfam Country Manager Nicholas Collof is on the left, and super-interpreter Anna Borodina in the centre.

As part of his ongoing work with Oxfam in Russia, Geof Cox recently led a 3-day social enterprise training conference in Ostashkov, midway between Moscow and St.Petersburg.

Participants were mainly from NGOs already involved in Oxfam's anti-poverty programme, but the conference also drew participants from a number of Russian Funds interested in social enterprise, as well as WWF, which is partnering Oxfam in a project out in Siberia creating alternative livelihoods for indegenous people currently over -exploiting a conservation area. Clearly, social enterprise will have a role to play there.

For more on social enterprise development in Russia please see Geof Cox's Blog. If you can read Russian go here.

 

 

 

 

Launch of The Childcare People...

As part of his on-going work on social enterprise development with South Tyneside Council, Geof Cox has assisted the establishment of The Childcare People. This new model child care social enterprise has been developed by childcare experts Training in Childcare, and was launched by David Milliband, then Foreign Secretary and MP for South Shields, on 22nd February 2008. See some of the local press coverage here.

 

 

 

 

 

Template Social Firm Share Community Interest Company...

2008 saw the publication of the second in Geof Cox's series of template Social Firm organisational structures.

This template takes the relatively unusual form of a share community interest company. More than three quarters of community interest companies take the guarantee company form, but it is the share community interest company that has the potential to open up the full range of both commercial and charitable funding sources, as well as enabling employees to participate financially in the success of their Social Firms.

This is an important example constitution because it contains notes on the whys and wherefores of community interest company design, and detailed instructions on how to actually establish a community interest company. Most of this accompanying information is applicable to any social enterprise, though some specific objects, equal opportunities, and other details of the structure do relate specifically to a social enterprise that will employ people with disabilities.

The new Template is available from Social Firms UK.

The new externalisation guide

Geof Cox's last publication, also available from Social Firms UK, was Bringing Social Firms Out Of Public Authorities. This guide actually provides a road map for any public sector service or department that wants to 'float off' as an independent social enterprise. It does obviously cover the special features of work training and simulation activities for disabled people, but much of the content explains general issues such as setting up an external organisation, the transfer of staff and assets, and so on, that are common to any externalisation.

 

 

 

The Common Cause Foundation report Insolvency, Employee Rights and Employee Buyouts, edited by Geof Cox, was launched in the UK Parliament on 14th December 2006 and in Brussels at the European Federation of Employee Share Ownership 'Top 100' Conference on 15th December.

Read more on this and other not-so-recent stories in the News archive