By Philip Mawhinney
On Wednesday this week, St Paul’s cathedral hosted Gordon Brown and the Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, in an ethical and moral discussion of the global recession entitled ‘My word is my bond? Rebuilding trust – the G20 and beyond.‘ It was all very eloquent and even (surprisingly) funny but what did it add to the conversation about poverty that the Need NOT Greed campaign is part of?
The recent Living Values report, produced by Community Links, shows how the place of values in third sector organisations is what makes the sector special. It identifies a set of values held in common across the sector. Need NOT Greed, with its emphasis on the people who actually experience poverty and the need to work cash-in-hand, clearly cherishes these values, including making voices heard, transforming lives and generating public wealth.
Wednesday’s event was run by the St Paul’s Institute, which is a ‘Forum for 21st Century Ethics’. So, much of the talk from messrs Brown and Rudd was about values. The main point, hammered home, was that the market is still the best way to lift people out of poverty – we just need to tip the balance away from rampant self-interest, back towards a values-driven market. The vision of transforming lives through the generation of public wealth could be seen as a value shared by some of us in the sector and the higher echelons of government.
Both Brown and Rudd highlighted the need to be responsible, another value highlighted in Living Values, as key to the new, global, shared set of values needed to renew the market in a way that will defeat poverty. It would have been difficult for an event held amidst the religious grandeur of St Paul’s to avoid religious references and so the British PM dutifully read a long list of quotes from Sikhism to Christianity, all saying essentially the same thing – everyone should be responsible and act fairly to all.
It’s all very well talking about global, mutual responsibility. It sounds quite nice when framed in global terms. But at Need NOT Greed, we believe that it would be responsible on the government’s part to recognise that the majority of people who do claim benefits and work informally do so to survive – often out of responsibility to their families.
Gordon Brown talked passionately and, I believe, sincerely about the global recession being an opportunity to reframe the economic world in a way that will help the world’s poorest people. I hope he doesn’t forget the about ones down the road…
For more on the campaign, visit www.neednotgreed.org.uk.
Transcript of PM’s speech here
Download Living Values
