Angela Smith, minister for the third sector at Good Deals 09

This morning, I listened to Angela Smith MP, minister for the third sector, speak at Good Deals UK - the national social investment conference.

She pointed out that social enterprises contributed £8.5 billion to the UK economy in 2005, and added that ‘we need to unlock the power of the third sector’ in order to ‘create the public services of the future’. She also said that the Government shares many of the aims of the social enterprise and third sectors - it wants to achieve social justice, for example, and believes that the sector has a major role to play in helping the most vurnerable people in society.

And so the Government wants to help the social investment market grow, which is why it has put £215 million into Futurebuilders, £70 million into Communitybuilders and £100 million into the Social Enterprise Investment Fund. The Government needs to plug the gaps, show what is possible and lead the way, she said.

She also talked about the consultation for the social investment bank which closed in October and got nearly 900 responses. The Government is now going through them and will use the ideas generated to inform how it will progress with it. She made it clear that the comments will be invaluable in deciding how to set up the bank.

She also said that the social investment market can only take off if can be shown to have a social value. Therefore third sector organisations need to be able to show its social and environmental impact - social return on investment.

She finished where she started by pointing out that the current economic climate means challenges but also massive opportunities. There is a £30 billion market in ethical goods and services and customers are increasingly aware of how they can drive social change with their wallets.

Comments

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