This year’s British American Project (BAP) conference in Edinburgh focused on Sustainability and Development. At a time when the world is facing a crisis in terms of global warming and depleting natural resources, this conference could not have come at a better time. As some of the leaders of tomorrow it is imperative that we instigate debate and pool ideas as to what we as individuals and collectively should and could be doing.
I organised a panel debate for this year’s conference, simply because I didn’t want the conference theme to be solely about the planet (climate change and the green agenda). In my world of Social Firms it is also about people. I’m forever talking about the need to create sustainable, paid jobs for people who are too far removed from the open labour market to compete in the mainstream. These are mainly people with mental health problems, learning disabilities, other disabilities, ex-offenders (90% of whom have one mental health problem and 70% apparently have two), homeless people and ex-drug and substance abusers.
Alan Baker & Paul Miller, Brighter Future Workshop
Mental illness is the common denominator within the latter groups. Add this to their situation and they don’t stand a hope in hell of getting a job with the average employer (according to a recent survey, 60% of employers admitted they wouldn’t consider employing someone who’d had a mental health problem2). The jobs aren’t there for individuals facing such significant barriers to employment – especially now other job seekers have risen in numbers and ability. It is surely wrong to consign more than a million people who grapple with these disadvantages on a daily basis – yet who want to work – to the scrapheap of unemployment for the rest of their lives. It is simply not a sustainable route forward.
This is where the ‘development’ bit comes in – Social Firms are market-led businesses that compete in the open market but which are set up specifically to create paid, sustainable employment for people with severe disadvantages. These are businesses which re-invest their profits back into achieving their social mission of creating jobs for people who would otherwise struggle to get work. A quarter of the workforce needs to be employed from this group if they are going to be regarded as a Social Firm. We have printers, website design companies, guest houses, travel agencies, recycling companies, contract gardeners and caterers….market opportunities are seized for social good.
It works too! We’ve grown the number of Social Firms from 5 in 1996 to more than 170 today and all without any central Government intervention. My message is: imagine what more we could do to help our economy save money and sustain our communities if we managed to co-ordinate some support from Government in order to grow the number of Social Firm businesses.
For someone to be really empowered economically and socially they need to have a paid job. There’s no point creating short term, unsustainable jobs to help people with multiple disadvantages move into employment; the groups we’re talking about need ongoing support to enable them to maximise their own potential within the workplace. But one thing’s clear – this support is still cheaper than that person being unemployed for the rest of their lives. The tangible benefits that this has for both the individual and society far outweigh the investment in this model as a sustainable option.
The guesthouse in Edinburgh, for example, alone saves the NHS approximately £21k per year for every person with a mental health problem that they employ within the business. Collectively, all the Social Firms and emerging Social Firms in the UK save the Government approximately £30m in benefits alone because of who they create employment for. Let’s remember that otherwise, these individuals are more likely to be unemployed than in an open labour market job because of the complexity of their support needs.
Nathan Dobie & Mick Parker, CREATE Liverpool
Social Firms are one type of social enterprise and the simplest definition for social enterprise is ‘any business that trades for a social and/or environmental purpose’. They reinvest their profits back into meeting this purpose and whilst the specific purpose of Social Firms is to create paid jobs for severely disadvantaged people, other types of social enterprises have a very broad variety of missions. So the Eden Project is a social enterprise, for example, as is Café Direct and Coin Street Community Builders on London’s South Bank…all with their own particular mission. What links them, however, is a drive to tackle social or environmental issues through enterprise and beyond a doubt this has got to be the most sustainable route to improving the world in which we all live.
I am passionate about the value of social enterprise (and of course Social Firms in particular) to this country and indeed the world. It was a privilege to be able to bring this passion to the BAP conference in Edinburgh via my panellists talking about the question of sustainability and development – it certainly sparked debate throughout the few days that we were all together.
So find out more about social enterprise – you can’t help but be inspired. Here are just some websites to whet your appetite and help your learning – or you could just pick up the phone and talk to me!
Social Enterprise Coalition: www.socialenterprise.org.uk
Social Firms UK: www.socialfirmsuk.co.uk
National Visit Programme: www.visitsocialenterprise.co.uk
Posted by Administrator on behalf of Sally Reynolds, CEO, Social Firms UK. If you would like to talk to Sally, she is happy for us to share her phone number so please email us at info @ platform10.org
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