Anthony Barnett (London, OK): The row over citizenship raises some big issues which I'll write about tomorrow, but one of them seems only to have been picked up on in the Daily Mail report and it is a grave indicator of the disgusting corruption of political life that it seems to have gone unremarked elsewhere, even in Tim Garton Ash's interesting and intelligent article today. In two places Goldsmith's report suggests monetarising citizenship:
Young people who volunteer to receive a reduction in tuition fees, if they volunteer prior to going to university, and help with the repayment of student loans, if they volunteer afterwards.
Advertising volunteering opportunities to which councils attach a small council tax rebate – reflects the contribution of the volunteer to the community
The Mail asked Goldsmith about this and reports:
He also proposed a cash-back system to encourage good citizenship. Adults who start recycling schemes, run residents' associations, or help teach schoolchildren to read should be rewarded with council tax rebates, he proposed.
Students who volunteer, for example to help run pressure groups, should get money off their tuition fees or student loans.
Lord Goldsmith declined to put a figure on the amount of money students might expect to claw back from their fees and loans for citizenship work. But he said it should be enough to provoke genuine interest.
The presumption is that people should be paid for acting in the common good. But this undermines the foundations of civic values and civil society: that there are things we do together for the common good which we do well because we do not so them for money. And by well I mean efficiently, effectively and even in the best sense economically meaning unwastefully.
Mike Edwards has just published a great pamphlet with the Young Foundation which I hope openDemocracy will cover soon. It is a critique of the values of 'philanthro-capitalism'. At one point he condemns "The dilution of 'other-directed' behaviour by competition and financial incentives (for example, paying volunteers)". Quite so. I have blogged earlier about how Goldsmith was picking up a £1 million a year from a US law firm and representing Russian oligarchs while overseeing his report on citizenship. Now we can see why these activities were a disqualification.
