The Commission has been asked to consider some of the big issues facing the borough and its residents in light of the country’s current social and economic challenges - or as the Chair puts it, what 'principles of fairness can be applied to help triage limited resources in periods of economic hardship?'
Between November 2012 and March 2013 the Commissioners will gather evidence based on research and conversations with residents, businesses and voluntary and community groups. They will hold several public meetings focussing on the themes of communities and housing (the focus of this week's meeting); income and employment inequalities; and safety nets and mutual responsibility. Commissioners, residents, interested others are also encouraged to blog here. There is, of course, a twitter feed - @THFairness. The Fairness Commission will report on its findings in spring 2013 and make recommendations designed to promote equality and fairness in Tower Hamlets.
The Borough is not the first to launch a Commission of this nature - see here for a summary of the other Commissions. Conclusions from across the Country have varied. Some have focused on the determination of high level principles. Others have recommended specific public policy interventions - such as the adoption of the Living Wage. In summary, the desire to achieve fairer outcomes has followed well trodden debates regarding ethics, moral purpose and the appropriate balance of obligations between the individual; civil society; state; and business. What differs is the blend and emphasis of these perspectives. It's early days for the Tower Hamlets Commission but a flavour of the Chair's thinking was revealed in his contribution to the "thought for the day" slot on Radio 4's Today programme on Monday 26th November. A transcript of which is below:
A report just out by the TUC argues that Britain’s poorest families
are facing further hardship as public services are cut back in
order to meet the Government’s spending targets. Such cutbacks
obviously impact the poor more than the wealthy simply because the
poor rely a great deal more on public services. Some argue that these
cuts, along with those to the welfare budget, are an essential route
to overall fiscal responsibility. Others insist that because they fall
disproportionately upon the vulnerable they are fundamentally unfair.
So what then do we mean by fairness? This is a question with which I
have become increasingly engaged since I recently took up the Chair of
the Tower Hamlets Fairness Commission. Our job is the unenviable one
of trying to describe how a community like Tower Hamlets - already
vastly unequal - can best navigate a fair path through a future of
increasing austerity. What principles of fairness can be applied to
help triage limited resources in periods of economic hardship? These
are not, of course, theological questions. And yet they are ones on
which pretty much all religious traditions have something indirectly
to contribute. Yes, as one of the most diverse boroughs in London, the
commission necessarily reflects a wide variety of religious and indeed
non-religious perspectives. And looking for what we all have in common
can easily lead to some anaemic lowest common denominator.
Nonetheless, what all monotheistic faiths do seem to share is the idea
that, as John Donne once put it, “No man is an island” - that is: we
all have some fundamental responsibility for each other. This idea is,
I suspect, historically connected with the development of monotheism
and with the belief that because reality has some unified origin then,
however diverse we may be as a society, we are nonetheless
fundamentally connected. In contrast to, say, Greek polytheism that
imagined a world where the gods were forever at war with each other,
it is no co-incidence that the world’s first great monotheistic faith
- Judaism - was also the first faith to develop an ethics of equality.
Still, this only takes us so far developing a response to the question
of fairness. Theology does not neatly hand out policy proposals or any
detailed programme of action. And it’s here that religion can have
nothing to do with politics. Nonetheless, politics works on many
different levels. Those who speak on both the left and the right about
the idea of One Nation Britain are emphasising the need for a society
in which we are all called to bear one other’s burdens. I know this
can easily sound like some call for generalized benevolence. But it’s
more than that. It’s a sense that my own flourishing is fundamentally
bound up with yours. That rich and poor and not forever locked in some
desperate zero sum competition over resources. And indeed, without
some sense of underlying connectedness – from individuals, from
business, from government - it’s actually hard to imagine that any
form of politics will ever be able to make things right or fair.
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