Cyberunions Podcast: Episode 54 This is What Democracy Looks Like in a Workplace

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We have Stephen and Walton and … Some one else??

• It’s coop fortnight and we’re speaking to MJ Ray about cooperatives. MJ is a member Software Coop

How does it work?

• Production  but consensus decision-making as far as possible   – we are a collective (we fired the boss)  but other co-ops like The Co-operative Group  and JohnLewis Partnership look more like other hierarchical businesses.

How do we relate to other co-ops?

• Our co-ops is a member of other co-ordinating co-ops like http://www.scotland.coop/ and http://www.uk.coop/
  • We prefer to trade with other co-ops, but most of our business is still with private businesses.
  What is a coop?
  Formal internationally-agreed definition: http://www.ica.coop/coop/principles.html
  • are there different coop structures?
  • What are they?
  • Consumer and user co-ops: the members are customers who buy through the co-op
  • Worker and producer co-ops: the members are the workers or people who sell through them
  • Variations of these, or mixes like multistakeholder
  • http://cultivate.coop/wiki/Types_of_Cooperatives
  Co-operatives and Labour movements: not as many links as there should be? Disputes:
  • Walton thinks of Unite and Co-operative Distribution
  • MJ thinks of GMB and Co-operative Funeralcare derecognition
  • Various consequences. For example, UK’s biggest Co-operative not currrently welcome at http://www.tolpuddlemartyrs.org.uk/index.php?page=martyr-s-festival festivals
  What are the politics of co-ops?
  • Consumer co-ops maybe leftish?
  • The co-operative group a major donor to http://www.party.coop
  • Worker co-ops maybe more mixed: strong individualist, anarchist and libertarian strands?
  Would you say all coops are better than no-coops?
  • Can you speak about any bad coop experiences?
  • MJ ducked this, partly because of a dispute with a co-op http://www.civilsociety.co.uk/finance/news/content/11518/social_enterprise_mark_threatens_legal_action_against_members_of_its_former_parent
  Capitalism versus co-operativism
  • UK co-op economy growing faster than the UK capitalist economy – major report published in co-ops fortnight http://s.coop/q0uq
  How do you start a co-op?
  What advice do you have for people wanting to start one.
  • Smaller co-ops often start informally, but bigger/riskier ventures best to agree the ground rules and that you are a co-op fairly early on.
  • http://www.uk.coop/start/
  • http://www.co-operative.coop/enterprisehub
  • Maybe international links should be on http://cultivate.coop/wiki/Starting_a_cooperative
  • http://cultivate.coop international wiki resource
  Is now an opportunity for co-ops?
  • People tired of things like Barclays Bank fibbing http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/content/view/full/120796
  • Lots of legal groundwork done over the past decade to enable co-op expansion. Credit Unions now able to serve more people http://findyourcreditunion.co.uk/ and there’s pressure more responsive banking generally http://www.moveyourmoney.org.uk
  • MJ can’t pronounce Caja Laboral, the bank linked to the Mondragon Co-operative Corporation http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caja_Laboral
  • The Co-operative Energy success in Which? Big Switch content, but capped the number of customers so that it didn’t hurt customer service http://www.cooperativeenergy.coop/2012/06/22/co-operative-energy-triumphs-at-which-awards-2012/ – would any private provider have done that, or would they just take as many as they could?
  Converting businesses to co-ops: what to do about “Well the boss took the risk in creating this, so we should be loyal to the boss”?
  • Tricky challenge, not a position MJ has been in.
  • Sometimes risk is shared by the workers, so arguably should be a co-op.
  • Sometimes the boss wants to leave – worker succession? http://www.somerset.coop/node/60 and this was sort-of how John Lewis became worker-owned http://www.johnlewispartnership.co.uk/about/our-founder.html
  • BBC TV series “Baker Boys” about a worker co-op running a bakery http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b017ljl1/episodes/guide
  The best praise for this show would be more people buying from co-ops
  • http://www.uk.coop/cooperate app to find co-ops (US version to come?)
  • http://www.uk.coop/directory/allhttp://www.find.coop/ are web directory versions
  First show recorded with http://jitsi.org over XMPP
  

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