The numbers behind the Big Society

Following the government’s launch of the Office for Civil Society and the "Building the Big Society" [pdf] strategy, I thought it might be useful to look at some of the numbers behind the Big Society - what does it look like now?

I’ve taken most of the figures from NCVO’s Civil Society Almanac 2010, which we released last month. The Almanac is free to all NCVO members.

Below I've taken some of the topics from the strategy (participation, organisations and data), and looked at the statistics behind them

2 Encourage people to take an active role in their communities

The strategy states that the Government is aiming to "take a range of measures to encourage volunteering and involvement in social action".

The latest Citizenship Survey, published by CLG in 2009, shows that 41% of adults in England formally volunteer every year – that’s 17.1 million people. This figure has stayed roughly the same over the last 10 years, with a low of 39% in 2001 and a high of 44% in 2005.

The Government is also aiming to boost charitable giving and philanthropy. The UK Giving report estimates that 54% of adults give to charity, donating an average of £10 each year.

The strategy also outlines plans to get 16-year-olds volunteering through "National Citizen Service". While the Citizenship Survey doesn’t look at 16 year olds by themselves, it does find that 38% of 16-25 year olds already formally volunteer once a year.

4 Support co-ops, mutuals, charities and social enterprises

The strategy sets out plans to "support the creation and expansion of mutuals, co-operatives, charities and social enterprises", and to involve them further in public service delivery.

These organisations have seen a period of expansion over the last decade or so, with 55,000 new charities created since 2000. The voluntary sector has seen its income increase by £10 billion over the same period – with earned income and public service delivery driving much of this growth.

Contracts with and grants from government now accounts for 36% of the sector’s income – with just over half of this coming from local government. This funding is concentrated in larger organisations – two in every three charities with income over £1 million receive some income from government.

It’s also worth pointing out that while the government is a very important funder of the voluntary sector, in financial terms the sector is not significant to government – just 2% of government expenditure reaches the sector through grants or contracts. So even if the sector doubled its public service provision, it would still account for less than 5% of total statutory expenditure.

Mutuals, co-operatives and social enterprises have also seen growth over this period. The new Community Interest Company (CIC) form was launched in August 2005 – since then nearly 3,000 CICs have been created.

Mutuo’s Mutuals Yearbook 2009, which provides data on the mutual sector, highlights growth in another Big Society area – mutuals and co-operatives. GP co-operatives, Leisure Trusts, NHS Foundation Trusts and Co-operative Trust Schools are all examples of public service provision by mutual bodies.

5 Publish government data

While this might not have an obvious overlap with Civil Society, you might be interested in Martin Brookes’ blog at New Philanthropy Capital, where he makes the case for charities to be as open in providing data as government will be. This may be particularly true if voluntary sector provision is expected to take over from the state.

Have a look through your Almanac for much more information like this. Share any thoughts, or other useful statistics, in the comments below.