Big Society public services

Big Society public services

Public services lie at the heart of the new Government’s vision of a 'Big Society'. Schools, hospitals and police forces will be given greater freedom from central control and become more accountable to the public they serve.

Targets, regulations and directives from Whitehall will be dramatically reduced. Much more performance data will be made directly available to the public, who will be able to hold service providers to account through new mechanisms such as elected commissioners and local boards.

The right to run public services will be opened up to new mutuals, co-operatives, charities and social enterprises. Providers will be rewarded for the outcomes they achieve. 

The challenge now for policy makers and public service professionals is to translate this high-level vision into practical reality that can improve services even at a time of fiscal constraint. 

A number of issues will need to be addressed: 

  • What should the role of central government be in a more devolved world?
  • How can connectivity between organisations involved in civil action be encouraged?

Work programme

Fortunately, the path ahead is not entirely untrodden. A handful of public service leaders, both in the UK and abroad, have already demonstrated how many of the elements of the Big Society vision can work in practice.

They have transformed their services by applying the principles of local accountability, transparency and innovation while balancing some of the inherent tensions and tradeoffs.

The Institute for Government will bring these best practice examples to the forefront of the debate about how the Big Society can be achieved.

Through our collaboration with BBC's Today Programme, we are encouraging listeners to submit their examples of providing better public services for less cost.

Seminar series

We are also hosting a series of events to gives a platform to public service leaders to discuss the implications of the Big Society for public services.

These seminars will allow public service leaders to discuss emerging issues such as the role of central government, accountability and collaboration.

Insights from our seminar series will feed into our wider research on policy making, accountabilities and cross-organisational collaboration.

On 15 July we also held an evening seminar, The future for Conservative thinking, that covered some the challenges awaiting the Big Society.

For more information or to attend, email events@instituteforgovernment.org.uk.

Further reading

As our work unfolds, we will be uploading additional papers and resources to this page. Please bookmark this page and check back for further information. 

If you have further questions about our work in this area, email Adrian Brown (adrian.brown@instituteforgovernment.org.uk) or Kate Blatchford (kate.blatchford@instituteforgovernment.org.uk).