Society daily 04.02.10

Today's top stories Violent deaths of children "down 40%" Overdose inquest finds German doctor David Ubani "incompetent" TV product placement: Bradshaw bans "nasties" Think tennis for yes, home for no: how doctors helped man in vegetative state Most offenders have low skills and prison is the place to put that right, says Erwin James All today's Society stories Other news National pay bargaining "does real damage", according to analysis of public sector pay by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, the Financial Times reports. That said, the paper also reports that the IFS believes civil service pay is not inflated . Treatment of car crash victims has not improved in 20 years , according to the Daily Telegraph Big state is beautiful A small state, a big society? It's a fashionable notion in the salons of Notting Hill but does it have real traction outside? A survey out today suggests public support for the state as the principal provider of public services – the big state, if you like – is overwhelmingly solid . The findings of the poll of 2,000 members of the public, commissioned by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the Institute for Public Policy Research , include the following: 94% said the state should be most responsible for providing healthcare, compared with just 1% who said this should be left to individuals and families. 86% said the state should be most responsible for paying for the care needs of older people, compared with 8% who think this should be left to individuals and families. 72% said the state should be most responsible for ensuring that people have enough to live on in retirement, whereas 20% said it should be the responsibility of individuals. And while the public may like the idea of a strong civil society, and welcome citizen involvement, personalised budgets and self-help, they are not prepared to see the big society replace the state: While more than half (53%) support being given personal budgets for social care, 66% think the state is ultimately responsible for looking after elderly relatives. While 41% support parents being able to set up schools, 93% see the state continuing to be the main provider of education. Yes, the public do want more say in how a service is delivered, especially if they are dissatisfied with it. No, that doesn't meant they necessarily want (or have the time and energy) to run it. Yes, they like the idea that people should have the right to decide how they spend their social care budget allowance. No, that doesn't mean the state can slink off and wash its hands of responsibility for vulnerable people. It's a healthy belief, perhaps, that just because a council sets up a department of social capital it doesn't have automatic licence to shut down day centres and sack sheltered-housing wardens. Big cuts are seemingly inevitable. But surveys like this are a reminder that the consequent changes to public services are going to be painful and resisted. You sense that politicians are going to have to work a lot harder than simply calling for "a new set of relationships between the citizen and the state". Sign of the times How to recognise a social enterprise? Well, for a start, in future it will probably be flaunting its Social Enterprise Mark with pride . I recently wrote briefly about the mark, with the caveat that I didn't know what you had to do to qualify for it. I now know. To claim its mark a company will have to demonstrate it is "working primarily for social and/or environmental goals, and that 50% of its profits are reinvested towards those goals" (as well as having to shell out £99 a year). The idea is that it will help the public to identify genuine social enterprises (and spot imposters). You will soon see the mark on the cover of the Big Issue magazine , for example. There will be some tasty debates about who qualifies for the brand – and, I suspect, some strict policing of those (such as the media) who are loose or lazy with the term. As keen-eyed Peter Holbrook, the chief executive of the Social Enterprise Coalition , showed on his blog : "The mark was on my mind last weekend when I read an article by Jonathan Guthrie in the FT. I love that the FT is writing about social enterprise, but I don't love it when they call Green and Black's a social enterprise. They're tasty and organic, but only one bar was ever fair trade and that was Maya Gold. Neither fair trade nor organic alone = social enterprise." Society links Sign up for the SocietyGuardian email briefing Society on Twitter SocietyGuardian.co.uk Get ahead: the Guardian's public and voluntary sector careers page Hundreds of public and voluntary sector jobs