Planning for and overcoming the challenges to mutuals in town halls’ mixed models

By David Bicknell

Two pieces written around mutuals which might be worthy of a read this morning. The first is an examination of the ‘Oldham model’  in the Guardian’s Northerner Blog, which quotes an interview with Oldham Council leader Jim McMahon discussing the pros and cons of the outsourcing of services to co-operatives and mutuals.

The other is a discussion by PA Consulting’s Karen Cherrett for the Guardian’s Public Leaders Network which argues that without preparatory work, there is a risk that the ‘current enthusiastic but rather naïve rush to establishing mutuals to transform public service delivery will lead to wide-scale mutual failure.’