Society daily 19.10.10

• The NHS does not learn from complaints, a report by the health ombudsman, Ann Abraham concludes. She criticised the poor explanations, delays and failure to apologise by NHS organisations, the Daily Telegraph reports.

• Charities could face up to £5bn of cuts over the next 18 months, according to a report by New Philanthropy Capital, reported in Third Sector.

On my radar...

• My new Guardian blog, about the public spending cuts and their consequences. I think its going to be fun. Of a kind.

• Flip Chart Fairy Tales blogger Steven Toft (who will be a guest contributor to my cuts blog), who asks whether the NHS needs more managers. It already has too few, he argues, and getting rid of more is a high risk strategy:

Good management makes better hospitals. Cutting management costs to levels that would be unrecognisable in the private sector would almost certainly lead to worsening levels of service, even if the NHS were to continue in a steady state. To slash the management during a time of unprecedented organisational change is really asking for trouble.

• Blogger Redundant Public Servant (another guest contributor to my cuts blog) on the "strange half-life" of civil servants waiting for the cuts, and possible redundancy.

• Reports that the social housing budget is to be cut by 50%. Here's Sarah Webb of the Chartered Institute of Housing discussing it on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, and here's the accompanying BBC news report.

• Blogger Rich Watts' post about George Osborne and the inflammatory language of "welfare cheats".

• The Radio Four Today interview with the very self-assured Kathryn Birbalsingh, the school deputy head who has left her job after making a controversial speech attacking educational standards at Conservative party conference.

• Chief executives who tweet. After yesterday's Twitter list of council CEO's (see also Andrew Brightwell's blogpost here), here's one for charity chiefs, courtesy of @stevebridger.

• More reflections on Tory NHS policy from blogger Paul Corrigan: campaigning in poetry and governing in prose (part two).

• "The Extraordinary Ordinary": blogger Julian Dobson's review of Out of the Ordinary, a new book by legendary community organiser David Robinson of Community Links, in which the importance of face-to-face human relationships in successful social action emerges as a key theme. Dobson writes:

"What does that tell us about the idea of the enabling state, so dear to the advocates of a big society? I'd suggest that if we want to achieve that, the best investment will be in relationships - or, more precisely, in the people who can forge relationships.
You can't achieve that with hosts of public servants sitting in offices running programmes, and neither can you achieve it with huge outsourced contracts to companies that put efficiency before effectiveness.
Relationships happen face to face. Technology can and does help, but trust is built person by person. If people don't trust the state or its leaders, it may well be because they don't encounter them at a level likely to lead to any understanding."

Guardian and Observer Christmas Charity Appeal 2010

Nominations are now closed for our Christmas appeal 2010, which will support charities working with vulnerable teenagers and young adults. Many thanks to everyone who applied.

Our Christmas charity 2010 partners New Philanthropy Capital are now sifting through the 300 applications we recieved. A shortlist of projects will be submitted to a selection panel comprising Guardian/Observer and NPC staff at the end of October. Ten projects will be chosen.

We will contact both successful and unsuccessful applicants once the panel has reached it decision in early November. The appeal will launch towards the end of November and run until mid-January.

Events

Information Security and Identity Management in the Public Sector, 3 November 2010, London

Keeping pace with new threats. Hear from Christopher Graham, Information Commissioner and Belinda Lewis, Ministry of Justice

Capital Ambition Delivering services for London in an age of austerity, 15 November 2010, London. Join leading practitioners across London to rethink, redesign and reassess the way services are delivered

Guardian Social Enterprise 2010, 16 November, London. An interactive conference for anyone delivering public services or supporting social enterprises. Speakers include: minister for civil society Nick Hurd; Peter Holbrook, chief executive of the Social Enterprise Coalition; Allison Ogden-Newton, chief executive, Social Enterprise London; Lord Victor Adebowale, chief executive, Turning Point; Rod Schwartz, chief executive, Clearly So; Dai Powell, chief executive, HCT; Alastair Wilson, chief executive, School for Social Entrepreneurs.

Transforming Blue Light Services Innovating ICT for the emergency services, 24 November 2010, London.

Discover how the innovative use of technology will improve performance and response in difficult financial times.