Earlier this year, it was brought to our attention, by one of our Practitioner Council, that many City and County Councils were seeking feedback on their draft Development Plans for 2022-28.
Many of these draft plans did not include considerations for Social Enterprises.
With this in mind, we drafted a submission, and over the summer, have contributed to all 31 City and County Councils in the Republic of Ireland.
Our submission highlighted 4 key items:
1. A commitment to facilitate, enable and support the development of a vibrant Social Enterprise sector, as a valuable and important component of the overall Economic Development vision.
2. A commitment to work with Social Enterprises to access and develop appropriate fit for purpose land and buildings as spaces to enable development and growth of new services and products.
3. A commitment to include Social Clauses in Public Procurement.
4. A commitment to identity and disseminate best practice local examples of social enterprises and increase public understanding of their contribution to society and the economy.
SERI will continue to communicate the social enterprise agenda in a co-ordinated way, however, we suggest that it is important that the Local Authority also underpin that messaging to ensure coherence and to improve public understanding of social enterprise as a whole, and its contribution to society and the economy. This messaging can also provide ideas and inspiration for communities in meeting identified community services and product needs.
SERI has also offered to meet with any Authority to advise on how they might better support local Social Enterprises based on identified needs.
Please see below SERI’s submission in full. If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to get in touch.
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