Press Release : June 2003

Time Banks are the Future of Public Services in London Press Release , June 2003

New �co-production� approach filling gaps in London�s public and social services

The extraordinary growth of community time banks across London may be the clue to the vital missing link in public services � the ability to involve the beneficiaries as equal partners in the delivery of services.

That is the findings of the first progress report of the two-year-old London Time Bank, which now co-ordinates 27 local time banks in housing estates, doctor�s surgeries, schools and community centres all over the capital (18 months ago there were only three).

London Time Bank: Building London�s Social Capital is launched today (Wednesday 4 June, at the New Economics Foundation). The Meet the Time Bankers event brings together policy-makers and time bank participants in primary health care facilities, housing services, working to tackle mental health problems, building employment skills, environmental management and addressing crime and community divisions and exclusion.

Their message is that public services and regeneration fails unless the people who benefit from them � those who are least active in their community, including the elderly, disabled, refugees � are able to play an active role (the approach is known as �co-production�).

Time banks in London generated over 14,000 hours of activity from over 800 participants in the first 18 months of the London Time Bank � many of them young people, older people, people with disabilities and refugees, who are normally just the recipients of volunteering. That is why time banks in London are increasingly being used to:

* Provide new opportunities for London�s most excluded people and groups, including excluded youth, to develop their skills and life chances.
* Help local services become more effective and efficient.
* Measure the impact of public participation in public services.
* Rebuild local trust and create links between communities.
* Relieve underlying problems like alcoholism and mental ill-health by successfully creating social interaction. As many as 91 per cent of time bank organisers across the UK felt that participants in their time bank were building friendships and trust.

�The report sets out the impacts time banks can have. As many as 70 per cent of people with both a physical and mental health problem at a time bank in a doctor�s surgery said they had experienced some remission within six months of joining the scheme,� said London Time Bank co-ordinator Sarah Burns.

�Two years into the London Time Bank, it is becoming clear that time banks are the future for public services. Grant-makers, public and voluntary sectors need to require their projects and organisations to involve beneficiaries as equal partners in the delivery of services. Tick-box participation doesn�t work; neither does the one-way delivery of services by professionals. Time banks are capable of making the difference between success and failure.�

For more information or a full copy of the report findings and recommendations, or to attend the launch contact:

Claire Navaie: (w) 020 7089 2823, [email protected]
Karina Krogh: (w) 020 7089 2830, [email protected]
Sarah Burns, London Time Bank co-ordinator: (w) 020 7089 2859, (h) 020 8761 0968.
www.londontimebank.org.uk
www.neweconomics.org

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