The East Birmingham Theology Coop was an initiative of the Centre for Applied Christian Studies based at the Selly Oak Colleges in Birmingham.
I was Director of the Centre from 1987 until 1991.
As part of my involvement with East Birmingham I was for a while seconded to the East Birmingham Task Force. The Task Force was an initiative of the Thatcher Government. Its main task was to spend £1M a year in East Birmingham in order to revitalise the local economy and encourage local community initiatives and entrepreneurialism.
At the beginning of each financial year the Task Force would be invited to consider what projects should be funded, which community partnerships could be identified and encouraged and where and how the money could be most usefully directed and spent.
Following a discussion in the Theology Coop, made up of local clergy, community workers and lay people from the Churches an idea emerged which I proposed at the meeting.
The suggestion was to take the Electoral Roll and divide the money by the number of households and then to give each household a share of the cash.
It seemed to me that if we adopted this strategy that soon the cash registers would jangle as the money was spent over the counters in the local stores and businesses in East Birmingham. That the enrichment of the local community would be clear and tangible and the administrative costs would be kept low.
People with money to spend would have significantly greater purchasing power, significantly less debt and significantly greater autonomy.
There was a moment when the the paymaster of the Task Force who had joined us from London for the meeting appeared to be taken with the idea and for one brief, heady moment I really thought that it might happen.
Now following the relative failure of Quantitive Easing, given that most of the money ended up uninvested and in the Bank or spent on Bonuses, that enriching, for Bankers, mechanism for distributing wealth amongst the already wealthy, the idea that stemmed from The East Birmingham Theology Coop may have its moment.
Now the idea, floated by commentators in a number of Newspapers including the FT, is proposed under the nom de plume:
Helicopter Money.
Instead of giving the cash to the banks, give it to the people and they will spend it, business will boom, cash registers will jangle and the economy will become healthy and well seasoned.
Sometimes the simple ideas are the most profound.
Maybe now as the welfare debate rumbles on it is time for another simple idea to be tested?
Just as the new Work and Pensions Minister announced that the Personal Independence Payment was to be protected along with pensions, education, and various other sacrosanct budget items, so arguments about intergenerational justice have been raised. Such as for example questions about the triple lock on pensions meaning not only that wealthy pensioners retained both bus passes and free TV licences but at a time of zero inflation pensions rose by 2.5%.
Welfare is expensive to administer, it is costly to the exchequer, it raises all the tedious questions about the value of benefits and the benefits of of paying people not to work, the shirkers and strivers argument so beloved of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It foments the painful and costly comparison between the deserving and the undeserving. So 'us' are set against 'them' and society strains to find the point of balance between need and justice.
The idea of a basic citizens income is surely about to find its moment?
It is being promoted and tested in Scandinavian Countries, it is being proposed in New Zealand and debated in Canada and nearer to home it is being explored just north of the Border in Scotland (another argument for Cumbria to edge out of England and into the arms of a more enlightened democracy?).
So what would it mean and how could it be afforded?
International arguments suggest that if tax remained constant or rather than be defined as progressive or regressive became much more neutral levied on incomes above a certain level at a flat rate, and if the whole welfare budget was consolidated. Then a fund could be created which would allow each individual to receive a basic citizens income.
For those who could live on that money at whatever level it was set, all well and good, for those who wished to increase their income the the citizens income element would remain and tax would be taken at the nationally agreed level on earnings.
The Citizens income could, as is proposed in Scotland, itself be graduated, a lower level for those under a certain age, whether in full time education or, a higher level for adults reflecting perhaps the level at which currently benefits are paid and for pensioners a level reflecting the current pension, which of course reflects the Citizen Wage in the sense that the State Pension is deducted from the personal allowance so that where the pensioners income is higher than the current personal threshold they pay tax on that higher pension income.
Like 'helicopter money' the Citizens Income has the distinct advantage of simplicity, but it is also equitable, it leaves room for those who wish to pursue their dreams to do so, it would encourage a whole new generation of song writers, poets, novelists and artists to emerge without the constraints imposed by the need to generate income to feed and clothe and house themselves. It also removes the difficult balance between welfare and work, where too frequently the actual tax paid in the transitional period approaches 100% as welfare tapers whilst work doesn't pay sufficient to compensate the loss of benefit.
If the Chancellor was a truly reforming politician in a truly reforming administration who wished seriously to address the anomalies, difficulties and challenges within welfare as it has slowly emerged from Beveridge's initial vision of a 'safety net' then a citizens income offers a truly radical answer, it has the potential for slicing open the Gordian Knot of Welfare.
I was Director of the Centre from 1987 until 1991.
As part of my involvement with East Birmingham I was for a while seconded to the East Birmingham Task Force. The Task Force was an initiative of the Thatcher Government. Its main task was to spend £1M a year in East Birmingham in order to revitalise the local economy and encourage local community initiatives and entrepreneurialism.
At the beginning of each financial year the Task Force would be invited to consider what projects should be funded, which community partnerships could be identified and encouraged and where and how the money could be most usefully directed and spent.
Following a discussion in the Theology Coop, made up of local clergy, community workers and lay people from the Churches an idea emerged which I proposed at the meeting.
The suggestion was to take the Electoral Roll and divide the money by the number of households and then to give each household a share of the cash.
It seemed to me that if we adopted this strategy that soon the cash registers would jangle as the money was spent over the counters in the local stores and businesses in East Birmingham. That the enrichment of the local community would be clear and tangible and the administrative costs would be kept low.
People with money to spend would have significantly greater purchasing power, significantly less debt and significantly greater autonomy.
There was a moment when the the paymaster of the Task Force who had joined us from London for the meeting appeared to be taken with the idea and for one brief, heady moment I really thought that it might happen.
Now following the relative failure of Quantitive Easing, given that most of the money ended up uninvested and in the Bank or spent on Bonuses, that enriching, for Bankers, mechanism for distributing wealth amongst the already wealthy, the idea that stemmed from The East Birmingham Theology Coop may have its moment.
Now the idea, floated by commentators in a number of Newspapers including the FT, is proposed under the nom de plume:
Helicopter Money.
Instead of giving the cash to the banks, give it to the people and they will spend it, business will boom, cash registers will jangle and the economy will become healthy and well seasoned.
Sometimes the simple ideas are the most profound.
Maybe now as the welfare debate rumbles on it is time for another simple idea to be tested?
Just as the new Work and Pensions Minister announced that the Personal Independence Payment was to be protected along with pensions, education, and various other sacrosanct budget items, so arguments about intergenerational justice have been raised. Such as for example questions about the triple lock on pensions meaning not only that wealthy pensioners retained both bus passes and free TV licences but at a time of zero inflation pensions rose by 2.5%.
Welfare is expensive to administer, it is costly to the exchequer, it raises all the tedious questions about the value of benefits and the benefits of of paying people not to work, the shirkers and strivers argument so beloved of the Chancellor of the Exchequer. It foments the painful and costly comparison between the deserving and the undeserving. So 'us' are set against 'them' and society strains to find the point of balance between need and justice.
The idea of a basic citizens income is surely about to find its moment?
It is being promoted and tested in Scandinavian Countries, it is being proposed in New Zealand and debated in Canada and nearer to home it is being explored just north of the Border in Scotland (another argument for Cumbria to edge out of England and into the arms of a more enlightened democracy?).
So what would it mean and how could it be afforded?
International arguments suggest that if tax remained constant or rather than be defined as progressive or regressive became much more neutral levied on incomes above a certain level at a flat rate, and if the whole welfare budget was consolidated. Then a fund could be created which would allow each individual to receive a basic citizens income.
For those who could live on that money at whatever level it was set, all well and good, for those who wished to increase their income the the citizens income element would remain and tax would be taken at the nationally agreed level on earnings.
The Citizens income could, as is proposed in Scotland, itself be graduated, a lower level for those under a certain age, whether in full time education or, a higher level for adults reflecting perhaps the level at which currently benefits are paid and for pensioners a level reflecting the current pension, which of course reflects the Citizen Wage in the sense that the State Pension is deducted from the personal allowance so that where the pensioners income is higher than the current personal threshold they pay tax on that higher pension income.
Like 'helicopter money' the Citizens Income has the distinct advantage of simplicity, but it is also equitable, it leaves room for those who wish to pursue their dreams to do so, it would encourage a whole new generation of song writers, poets, novelists and artists to emerge without the constraints imposed by the need to generate income to feed and clothe and house themselves. It also removes the difficult balance between welfare and work, where too frequently the actual tax paid in the transitional period approaches 100% as welfare tapers whilst work doesn't pay sufficient to compensate the loss of benefit.
If the Chancellor was a truly reforming politician in a truly reforming administration who wished seriously to address the anomalies, difficulties and challenges within welfare as it has slowly emerged from Beveridge's initial vision of a 'safety net' then a citizens income offers a truly radical answer, it has the potential for slicing open the Gordian Knot of Welfare.
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