To sleep, perchance to dream

I need sleep. Last night was one of those awful vigils when 12 becomes 1, 1 becomes 2, 2 becomes 3 and just as some early adopting bird starts tweeting, you slip into a coma. I don’t know why, I’m not worried about anything, quite the opposite, there are some really interesting things going on at the moment.

Clearly the problem is switching off. I tend to be pretty full on when I work and to get out of that driven state I move to other interests like gardening, music and decorating. To that end I am looking forward to getting brutal with my strawberry patch this weekend and carrying on with the repainting of my hall. I am doing it incrementally having decided on the wall colour at the weekend and now floor colour last night, aided by my brilliant friend Lissa, decorator extraordinaire. The issue is, I suppose, switching off from switching off. I often get accused, particularly by my Mother, of being frenetic. I think of it more as stimulated. As the saying goes, if you want something doing, ask a busy person.

Today, first born, Joe is taking his piano exam, good luck Joe. In fact it’s quite a week for music exams with poor old Sam, second born, having exams for piano on Friday and guitar on Saturday. Katie is next up, and then finally Joe again with the trumpet. It makes us sound rather pushy, but the boys in particular can’t get enough of it. I think the motivation thing runs in the family. Maybe we need to take up yoga?

Today started with a phone interview for Social Enterprise Magazine on a piece they are doing on the problems social enterprises are having when they try to set up as independent deliverers within public services. I hope in my sleepy state I made some sense. This afternoon I have a Japanese delegation, my second this week which does not include a South Korean delegation on Monday with whom I had a fascinating discussion about social enterprise. In South Korea they have tax incentives for social enterprise, which is interesting. I’m looking forward to hearing more about that. We are working all over the world at the moment. SEL staffer, Catriona has just come back from Vietnam and Georgia, Lesley is in Croatia and I am off to Japan at the end of the month. All this work is with Governments, NGO's and social enterprises wanting to steer increased development. We don't have all the answers, in reality I am often blown away by what is happening elsewhere in the world, but we are seen as Global leaders and do have a lot to offer. Being part of a Global movement is a real privilege.

With Matt and the delegation from the Japanese Keizai Doyukai Foundation this afternoon

Later on today I am meeting our Minister Angela Smith at the House of Commons with a delegation from the Third sector to talk about the issues for social enterprise in the here and now. I should imagine the right to request will come up, as will investment, procurement and access to information. Our world is changing so quickly, it’s hard for everyone to keep up, maybe that’s why I can’t sleep?

Condoms and chocolate

Last night was ‘Vote Social Enterprise 2010’ (as well as our AGM), and quite a night it was. We held it at the lovely SEL members, Coin Street Community Builders landmark neighbourhood centre on the Southbank. To illustrate how diverse social enterprise is, and to get the evening off with a bang, so to speak, we handed everyone social enterprise condoms from One and some yummy Divine chocolate.

Being SEL’s first public intervention in the build up to the general election, we had managed to persuade Third Sector Minister Angela Smith and her Lib Dem and Tory shadows Jenny Willott and Nick Hurd to share a platform with myself and the magnificent June O’Sullivan of London Early Years Foundation. The aim was to get a bit of meat onto the three party’s plans for social enterprise.

With Third Sector Minister Angela Smith yesterday evening 

Angela kicked off by saying that government should “lead by example in buying from and working with social enterprises”. Music to the ears of the massed social entrepreneurs in the audience. She also exclusively revealed that a regular meeting of Cabinet Ministers examining the barriers to third sector organisations accessing contracts is “soon to be established”. She also said she’d have to shoot anyone who mentioned it outside the room – do you think that includes you?

I liked Nick's opening comments as he held up his packet of condoms and chocolate bar and wondered out loud whether he had to put them in the House of Commons Gifts Register? It got the best laugh of the evening.

One headline was the assurance from all three that the Office of the Third Sector will remain – something which will no doubt be met with sighs of relief from OTS staffers, and those of us who acknowledge how strong a contribution the OTS has made to social enterprise development not least in funding the Coalition's Social Enterprise Ambassadors Program and supporting our award winning work on Winning with social enterprise at 2012.

I was particulalry over the moon when Loona Hazarika from Silverback Works asked our panel what they were planning to do to safeguard the future of vital support organisations like SEL if Regional Development Agencies are to be threatened. All the candidates responded really positively culminating in Nick Hurd going so far as to say he, for one "would not like to tell Allison she isn't getting her money", sensible chap.

John Charles of Catering2Order, who I’m delighted to say has just been elected to the SEL board, provoked thoughtful responses to his excellent question on the potential of a social enterprise hub at the 2012 Games. Angela said she would raise it with Tessa Jowell, the Olympic Minister and Nick made clear that it was something that he would raise with Boris – watch this space.

Jenny made an important point on the Lib Dems policy of promoting community land trusts and offering disused public sector space to social enterprises at peppercorn rent – sure to go down well with our sylish hosts at Coin Street and over at the Development Trust Association.

Dai Powell of HCT Group mentioned the elephant in the room, with a question on plans to extend the right to request to all public services. This was particularly pertinent as the Government's own Competition Panel, set up to look at the Department of Health's u-turn on this, was itself banjaxed that very afternoon. In the light of which we got some interesting responses, particularly from Angela, who told us that Labour would examine the case to "expand the right to request, but we need to invest in the process and make sure that the private sector doesn’t just move in” and from Nick, who positively blasted Andy Burnham for "turning his back" on the policy – Tories, he said, are right behind the right to request “in principle, as we want to inspire people“. He even hinted that Mr Burnam's position on right to request was possibly, a potential leadership gambit. A thrilling moment, when the gloves came off.

June, who’s comments were nothing short of a tour-de-force, pressed harder on right to request. Looking for firmer commitments, she spoke on behalf of the room when she said, pointedly staring at our Minister, that she was not satisfied that either her question or Dai's had been answered. We didn't get any more but safe to say, the point had been made.

The whole thing was communicated through Twitter (which even a couple of years ago would have been unthinkable), under the tag #VoteSocEnt10. There were some strong contributions on there from the room, especially from Cliff Prior of UnLtd, who also asked a great question on engaging and supporting entrepreneurs.

All in we were delighted with the whole night, lovely comments from members – many of whom stayed with us to do justice to the wine. One of the things I love about social entrepreneurs is their enthusiasm for the big picture, they are, all in all, a very well informed lot. The room was animated as people talked into the night about what they had heard and who they would vote for. Roll on the election.

For full details have a look at David Ainsworth's quick off the mark piece in Third Sector this morning, and Chrisanthi Giotis's lovely article in Social Enterprise Magazine this afternoon.

Making a believer out of Boris...

London Mayor, Boris Johnson started to follow me on Twitter yesterday. I was able to welcome him and say how pleased I am when later on in the evening I bumped into him at the London Voluntary Service Council's 100th anniversary celebration at the Mansion House. It was a super evening with a great many familiar faces, including Drew Stevenson who was Chair when I was on LVSC’s board, John O’Brien (CEO at London Councils), Peter Lewis (CEO at LVSC), my old friend Stephen Bubb, CEO at acevo and of course Boris.

I always enjoy Boris’s speeches. As you travel with him to the destination of the point he wants to make, it often feels like a ramble, but it always turns out to be the route with views. He told us how incensed he was by the story during the snowy winter of the chap who was told not to clear snow from the path in front of his house in case anyone slipped on it, in which case he would be liable. Our mayor lamented a culture where people are put off taking responsibility. I thought of the heroic initiative taken by social entrepreneurs like those running the Parent Promoted Foundation, which was hinted at in Michael Gove’s interview with the BBC this morning, who are really willing to do something about my local, shambolic school.

Picking up Boris’s theme and that of schools I am very aware that we are entering the 'school trip' season. I hate school trips. I do not understand how schools that do not feel able to examine children for head lice feel confident in taking them abroad. Nor do I accept the ridiculous expense of these trips. To put it into perspective the state pays roughly £3000 per head for each child to attend a primary school per annum and yet parents at my school are asked to stump up a whopping £550 for each child to go to the Dordogne where they won’t speak French, eat French food or study French history. Instead they will bounce on French trampolines and jump out of French canoes.

In my day it was a day trip to Kew Gardens or memorably Southampton Docks to look at the cargo ships. I am particularly anti as my eldest Joe, an otherwise fit and healthy boy with manageable asthma has been hospitalised twice in his life, both times upon return from school trips. The last time I remember standing in a hospital ward watching Joe, oxygen mask on his face, fighting for every breath whilst I talked on my mobile to the Head teacher who explained that they had not been able to take him to a doctor in France, when he failed to respond to his medication, because she didn’t have sufficient staff. This is not in loco parentis but it is consistent with a society where teachers don’t feel they can put sun cream on kids on a sunny day, and need a signed parental permission slip to lead a class to the post box in front of the school to post a letter!

The number of parents struggling to make ends meet is rising in our neck of the woods, as the recession continues to bite and yet the cost of these mad trips is rising. The pressure on parents not to stigmatise their children by failing to come up with the goods is immense and yet seems of no consideration. As these jamborees occur during term time, children not on the trips have to go to school, by themselves. I think all such ventures in primary schools should be limited to day trips and while we are at it teachers should be able to put on sun cream, and every school should have a 'nit nurse' to stem the rising plague. Then and only then I might trust them to get as far as Southampton docks but would only want to sign up if the cost was affordable for everyone, and I mean everyone.

Tonight is the big night. We have our AGM and hustings. The line up includes our minister, Angela Smith and her Conservative and Liberal Democrat counterparts Nick Hurd and Jenny Willott. We have over 150 social enterprise leaders coming and chocolate and condoms to pass out. Thanks to Divine and Global Ethics for sponsoring the event and illustrating the fabulously diverse world of social enterprise. I hope to see you there, but if you can't make it you can follow the whole thing on Twitter under #VoteSocEnt10.

Allison in wonderland and mad March hares

Hare's are reportedly mad in March because its their mating season and the promise of some hare on hare action makes them silly.  My frenetic behaviour can not be attributed to anything so interesting but I am even busier than usual. The spring brings with it tendering, planting and of course the election, so its all go.

We are going to consolidate our work with young people and so have put together proposals to develop our successful Future Jobs Fund programme, and add a new initiative with the Youth Sector Development Fund that will get young people on to the path of success through the door marked 'social enterprise'. Too many young people are struggling to find an opportunity and at the same time social enterprises are really committed to giving them a helping hand. The feedback we have had from employees and employers participating in our London Future's 500 program is wonderful, so we know we're on the right track.

I've been working with the team on our Investors in People award, a quality kite mark SEL has had since 2002. It seems our Assessor is happy to recommend us yet again. I particularly enjoyed his assessment feedback yesterday which told us staff regard working at SEL as rewarding and fun. Whilst I'm often wary of the use of the word fun; have you noticed that things billed as 'fun' never are? Nonetheless for staff to describe working in the SEL team as fun is a description I'll happily take to the bank. Folk having fun enjoy what they do and people who enjoy what they do tend to do it well, in my view.  

I am concerned that this election seems to lack the will to really get to grips with the issues. I can't work out if its politicians pulling their punches waiting for the opposition to slip up, or maybe they are all just badly briefed?  I have been doing my bit running round talking to anyone involved in the electoral process about social enterprise and what we see as the main issues. Namely:

• The right for public sector workers to request to deliver services as social enterprises must be reaffirmed within the Department of Health and extended to all Government departments
• Business support must address the needs of social enterprises, be they start-ups or public sector spin-offs.
• Government must promote a strategy for social enterprise development that provides expert advice and guidance to would-be social entrepreneurs, exisiting public sector workers, local authorities and public sector procurers.
• The new world where cuts are not always a disaster because social enterprise can create savings without compromising on quality can only happen if we mean it to happen. That demands leadership and investment.  
• Government needs to understand that achieving a meaningful legacy around the 2012 Games cannot happen without social enterprise.  
• Money, there still isn't enough in the system to achieve the growth social enterprise is capable of. We know what we need and where it can come from, high street banks encouraged to become community lenders, the Social Investment Bank, private investors and government lending. More in the system will yield more growth, its that simple.

These measures will decide whether social entrepreneurs become Mock Turtles or Cheshire Cats. To that end I am looking forward immensly to putting our Minister, Angela Smith and her Conservative and Liberal Democrat conterparts, Nick Hurd and Jenny Willott on the spot tomorrow at our Annual General Meeting.  At SEL we try to make our AGMs memorable and this year will be no exception.  We have arranged a hustings where members can ask their questions, I'll do my best to make sure they get some answers.

Social enterprise moves from CSR to supply chain - its official

I've been to a few ministerial lunches where the hand picked guests make their case on a given topic for the benefit of the politician present. Our little lunch, with private, public and social enterprise leaders upping the anti on buying from social enterprise, this Thursday, was different. For a start Angela Smith, our Minister, was totally on the money, she didn't stand on ceremony and she really got stuck in sharing her views and asking loads of questions. Secondly everyone present was equally animated, leading to the most exciting conversation on procurement you can imagine. Thanks to the LDA for supporting us in making it happen.

Angela was shadowing Sophi Tranchell from Divine Chocolate for the day, as part of a social enterprise Ambassadors Programme initative. She told me she was learning all about the chocolate world and found it really interesting. Not unsurprisingly, I suppose.

At the lunch, held at the Baltic in Southwark, we did talk about Government being a bad shopper, but much more engaging than that we heard from Ray Mills, Partner of PricewaterhouseCoopers who told us about his clients that want to spend millions with social enterprise. Our old friend Colin Crooks, CEO at Green Works confirmed that in the early days their first contract with HSBC came in at 28 times their turnover. That's unthinkable in the public sector where contracts are often a maximum of no more than 25% of turnover. So maybe if social enterprises are to grow quickly, as Green Works did, the private sector as purchaser, is the place to start.

In any event no one was talking about CSR. For the big business in the room, social enterprise was a provider, not a post divided investment in PR. That has to be good news.

I'm looking forward to a day at the allotment. Because I have had so much on I have only been able to stay on top of the garden. I sorted out my 2010 seeds last night and put my seed potatoes out to chit (technical term for sprouting shoots) and tomorrow I'll be pruning my apple trees and soft fruits. I will no doubt end the day looking like I've had a fight with a mad cat, covered in scratches, but frankly, I can't wait. My idea of fun.

Playing with the big boys and girls

If you weren't there last night, you missed a fun one. In partnership with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) and our very own LDA we put on quite an event for social enterprise leaders. Entitled 'Question Time for Leaders in Social Enterprise' we had some fantastic speakers who told us what we needed to know to face the tough times ahead.  I am always delighted when I hear new stuff. Stephen Dawson of Impetus Trust told us how to address the elephant in the room, (which elephant, you ask? All the presentations were filmed beforehand and are on our website) Philip Wright of PwC gave us the means to weather the 'cold winds of the recession' and Rod Schwartz of ClearlySo, told us that we needed to stop being cute, grow up and look for investors.

Rod's stuff on investment capital was challenging and exciting. In my humble opinion he is one of the best commentators in the social investment world and although he and I have disagreed in the past, most notably on the social stock exchange, I think he is always worth listening to and has probably as much experience as anyone at the coal face of financing social transformation.

What struck me whilst watching PwC's opening (excellent) film is that if the assertions it makes about the impact of social enterprise are genuinely held by the organisation (as the presence as chair for the evening of the impressive Keith Mansfield, London Chairman of PwC testified to), then we have come a long way.  Don't get me wrong, its not that I don't take social enterprise seriously until Government or in this instance the mutinational world does; it's that looking at us through their eyes as we did last night makes you realise just how interesting we are.

Philip's assertion that insolvency is not always a bad thing was a shocker, but so was his rationale, which proved pretty compelling.  He talked about the need to close streams of activity down before they bring the whole structure to its knees and mothballing organisations before they lose their intellectual property as well as their assets. Food for thought.

We also heard from Anne Humphries, former board member of John Lewis and current board member of the London Development Agency. I was delighted that she voiced pride in her association with the UK's leading social enterprise, John Lewis.  I know there are those in our movement who think JL isn't a social enterprise, but I'm not one of them. I think the way they have thoughtfully constructed a business model around profit distribution, staff ownership, ethical behaviour and customer satisfaction is a thing of beauty and their recent success is something we should be proud of.

I woke up this morning to lots of lovely texts and emails from those who had come last night saying how much they enjoyed it.  The use of the word 'superb' more than once helped my early morning tea go down very nicely. Thank you to all who took the time to come and especially those who fed back afterwards. I forwarded all your comments on to the SEL team, who of course worked their socks off.

Tomorrow we host a lunch to discuss procurement.  The purpose of the event, which is being run again in partnership with the LDA, is to bring a handful of folk together (from government, social enterprise and the private sector) who know a thing or two about it, and to discuss how we can empower social enterprises to win more business. I think it should be gripping and I am especially pleased that my co-chair Sophi Tranchell of Divine Chocolate is bringing along Angela Smith MP, Minister for the Third Sector, who, wonderfully is shadowing Sophi for the day under the Coalition's tremendous Social Enterprise Ambassadors' Programme.

Our Sabina, who is organising the event tells me she wants it in the style of me 'hosting it in my own home'.  That was a stretch for me since there will be no children suddenly deciding to practice the trumpet/piano/guitar as soon as the guests arrive and no rabbits and hampsters hopping and wheeling about to the dulcet tones of the ever rotating washing machine. In fact it won't be like being at home at all. I shall have to improvise.

Last Thursday I met Angela's new Director General at the OTS, Rolande Anderson who kindly gave me an hour of her time to chew her ear about social enterprise. I hope she found it helpful, she seemed really engaged. I often come away from meetings like that feeling sorry for folk who are continually subjected to lobbyists like me, but hey that's the job.  Mine to put our case and theirs to hear it.

I have also met up with loads of social enterprises this week, all at different stages of development, all with different needs and all absolutely inspiring. I am currently trying to make sure I have done everything for them that I said I would, again that's the job: to give (hopefully) good advice and to open doors. One person who doesn't need me to open any doors is the lovely Ed Mayo who I had a chat with on Monday. Ed is the new CEO at Coops UK and quite the nicest, most considered man I have met in a long time. We really put the world to rights and I'm excited (as the Americans say) about working closely with Coops UK as we did when my mate Pauline was at the helm.

Finally, and thank you so much to all of you who have enquired, after a lot of huffing (her) and puffing (me and my super sis Sue) my Mother's move is complete. I did manage to end last week with a rather unattractive nervous twitch in the left eye, but after a weekend with the family, gardening and watching Miss Marple re runs I can now hold a steady gaze. My Mother is adjusting rather well to her lovely cottage and has only locked herself out once, although Monday's revelation that she had managed to leave her passport at the old house did, I have to admit, feel like a step in the wrong direction.

I'm off now to fleece my bulbs, which bravely sprouted in last weekends clement weather and will now get scorched in the latest of what seems like an endless line of cold snaps. Life's so like that isn't it?