Thread by @williamdbrett

This week has been a bit strange. So I’m indulging in a little THREAD (forgive me) about #communitypower, the #levellingupwhitepaper and what really matters in life.
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I hold two beliefs simultaneously:

1⃣ That small, local, everyday, simple connections and acts of kindness give life meaning.
2⃣ That national politics and big public debates have a huge role in shaping what’s possible in life, what’s valued, what’s prioritised.
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The #levellingupwhitepaper contains language, ambitions and proposals that I (and many others of course) have spent years working hard to make happen. For instance:
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🔸Real commitment to #communitypower, including the idea of local 'community covenants' between councils and communities – as we @right_hereUK and others have been calling for:
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🔸Local influence over vital post-Brexit regeneration funding (as we @LocalityNews @CooperativesUK @peoplesbiz @PlunkettFoundat have been campaigning for via #CommunitiesinCharge):
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🔸A general recognition that government policy has, until now, overlooked a vital element of what drives wellbeing and prosperity – ie. community.

And yet…
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It’s a White Paper, and White Papers by definition can't express the real, extraordinary potential residing in communities everywhere.
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It has been published during what look like the last days of a grotesque PM who has cast a shadow over everything, including the basic faith that politics is worthwhile.
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It has clearly been driven by Gove and Haldane through the gritted teeth of Whitehall, which retains a deep suspicion of the supposedly unaccountable and immeasurable (but in fact incalculably valuable) power of community.
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And even then, it is in the main only rhetorically committed to these ideas for empowering communities, with unclear routes to achieving anything meaningful (that’s why we need a Community Power Act, by the way – right-here.org/why-a-communit…)
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I’m left with the ambivalence of believing (still) in politics as a way of celebrating and creating space for what makes life meaningful; and knowing that what makes life meaningful takes place at a much simpler level. The level of community and everyday life.

So what to do?
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I think the answer is to live with that ambivalence. When I hear the leaders of @right_hereUK describing BOTH their own unquenchable desire to make things happen locally AND their desire to change things nationally, I am inspired to follow their lead. right-here.org/if-i-led-level…
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So that’s what I’ll do.

With thanks to @jonjalex @katoglet @richardgnbell Ed Wallis and others for conversations this week. And to @inayatomarji @DeanaWildgoose Andy Sacha @neelamheera @fordhallfarm and @angelafell for their inspiration.
ENDS