This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from Explore Bristol Research, http://research-information.bristol.ac.uk Author: Mckeon, Theresa A Title: Public Services, Private Values The Society of the Merchant Venturers of Bristol and the Changing World of Welfare Service Provision in England, 1975-2017 General rights Access to the thesis is subject to the Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial-No Derivatives 4.0 International Public License. A copy of this may be found at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/legalcode This license sets out your rights and the restrictions that apply to your access to the thesis so it is important you read this before proceeding. Take down policy Some pages of this thesis may have been removed for copyright restrictions prior to having it been deposited in Explore Bristol Research. 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Public Services, Private Values: The Society of the Merchant Venturers of Bristol and the Changing World of Welfare Service Provision in England, 1975-2017 Theresa Ann McKeon A dissertation submitted to the University of Bristol in accordance with the requirements for award of the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Arts, Department of History August 2019 Word Count: 79,652 i Author’s Declaration I declare the work in this dissertation was carried out in accordance with the requirements of the University’s Regulations and Code of Practice for Research Degree Programmes and that it has not been submitted for any other academic award. Except where indicated by specific reference in the text, the work is the candidate’s own work. Work done in collaboration with, or with the assistance of, others, is indicated as such. Any views expressed in this dissertation are those of the author. ii Abstract This dissertation analyses the historical intersection between welfare state retrenchment policies and philanthropy on a local scale between 1975 and 2017; an intersection that developed through successive cross-party government policies which curtailed the power and responsibilities of local authorities and sought to transfer the provision of state services to private-sector and philanthropic providers, themselves operating competitively to improve services and ‘client’ satisfaction. This dissertation uses a case study approach to examine this national trend on a local scale by tracing the transfer of private-sector values onto the provision of welfare services. It focuses on one philanthropic organisation, the elite Society of Merchant Venturers (SMV) and one local authority, Bristol. An organisation comprised of businesspeople, SMV was built on and operated with private-sector values, but it has also, through the determination of some of its members, become a significant philanthropic provider of welfare services in Bristol over the past forty years. It is this tension between private-sector practices, philanthropic purpose and the Society’s role as provider of public services that this thesis uncovers, placing particular emphasis on the effect non-statutory providers had on the quality and nature of local welfare services, as well as within SMV itself. Part one concerns education, where SMV attempted to bring about a cultural shift in its pupils at its academies through the implementation of private-school practices with mixed results. Part two considers how its care homes modernised and professionalised their services as SMV sought to fill a vacuum in provision for elderly people created by welfare state retrenchment policies. In doing so, SMV risked focusing its attention on private-sector values rather than the philanthropic aspect of its work. Overall, this thesis uses the case study of SMV to argue that welfare state retrenchment was a far more localised process than has hitherto been acknowledged, more influenced by local factors and actors with their own complex agenda, values and institutional histories. This research also has wider implications beyond Bristol and SMV. Welfare state retrenchment of the provision of services affected the nature of state-maintained services across England, as well as the philanthropic sector as a whole. Acknowledgements I owe my thanks to many people for their support throughout my PhD. To Professor Hugh Pemberton and Dr Grace Huxford for providing endlessly insightful, helpful feedback, valuable suggestions for improvement and for guiding me through the process. Thanks also Professor Robert Bickers and Dr James Freeman for providing thought-provoking advice early on, in the ‘upgrade.’ I would also like to thank the Society of Merchant Venturers for generously funding my research and opening its archives to me. Thank you to the Hall staff for helping me to find what I needed and providing a space in which I could work. Thank you to all of the people that answered questions and participated in oral history interviews. A special thanks goes to Anthony Brown for his sincere support, ensuring I was equipped with the resources I needed and for taking the time to show and explain to me different aspects of SMV and its work. I am so grateful to my friends and family for their unwavering encouragement. Thank you especially to Claire and Anna for their friendship and advice, to my PhD ‘family’, Vivian, Chris and Chad for making the last few years so enjoyable and keeping me laughing. Thank you to John for his empathy and humour. I extend a big thank you to my mom and dad who have instilled in me in a sense of independence and hard work and who have always unquestionably supported me and my goals. List of abbreviations BCCS Bristol Cathedral Choir School CCF Combined Cadet Force CGS Colston’s Girls’ School CMA Competition and Markets Authority CQC Care Quality Commission CSCI Commission for Social Care Inspection CTC City Technology Colleges GDST Girls’ Day School Trust IB International Baccalaureate IMF International Monetary Fund LEA Local Education Authority LMS Local Management of Schools NAA National Association of Almshouses NHI National Health Insurance NHS National Health Service PAI Public Assistance Institutions SEN Special Educational Needs SMV Society of Merchant Venturers WCS Withywood Community School Table of Contents Introduction…………………………………………...…………………………………..……………1 Who, what and why…………………………………………………………………..………….1 Welfare state retrenchment……………………………………………………………………...4 Education policy and retrenchment, 1944-2017…...…………………………………….……....12 Residential care for the elderly: policy and retrenchment, 1948-2017………………….………..17 Methodology and sources………………………………………………………….…………...22 Research questions and chapter structure…………………………………………..…………...34 Chapter One - Parochial and Paternalistic to Professional Philanthropy? Voluntarism in the late Twentieth and early Twenty-first Centuries……………………………………………………………………..….37 Introduction……....…………………………………………………………………………....37 Concepts of ‘charity’ and philanthropy’……………………………………….………………..38 From selective pensions to ‘cradle to grave’ care, 1900-1950……………………………………39 Re-emergence of the voluntary sector…………………………………………….…………….47 Philanthrocapitalism and social entrepreneurialism…………………………….……………….52 Private-sector philanthropy in practice…………………………………………..……………...54 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………….………………57 Chapter Two - ‘Dragged into the Twenty-first Century’: SMV’s Evolution from Gentlemen’s Club to Social Entrepreneurial Organisation………………………………...……………………..……………59 Introduction………………………………………………………………………………...…59 The men at Merchants’ Hall…………………………………………….………………..……..61 Clothes make the Merchant…………………………………….……………….…………..….64 A professional opinion…………………………………………….……………………….…..65 ‘A woman of sufficient calibre’……………………………………………………………..…..69 Inside the committee room…………………………………………………………………….75 Viewing national trends in charity through a Bristol lens…………………….………………….79 Long-standing challenges…………………………………………………….………………...86 Conclusion………………………………………………………………….…………………89 Chapter Three - ‘Educational Amateurs’ or ‘Raising Aspirations’? The Influence of SMV’s Private-sector Values on the Ethos of Merchants’ Academy, 2004-2007…………………………………………..……91 Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………...91 The private sector’s increasing influence, 1975-1997…………………………………………...92 Central government consensus……………………………………………….………………...95 Discord and debate……………………………………………………………………….……99 Bristol’s under-performing schools……………………………………………………….…...102 Friends in high places…………………………………………………………………...…….105 Withywood Community School…………………………………………………..…………...110 ‘Merchant Values’…………………………………………………………………………….112 Opportunities outside of the classroom………………………………………………………114 Careers and employability…………………………………………………………………….119 Sixth form struggles…………………………………………………………………………..121 Performance…………………………………………………………………….……………126 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………….…………...128 Chapter Four - From Fee-paying to Free: An Independent School’s