The health and social care system is changing. The Government is committed to an ongoing process of modernising and reforming the way services are provided. It wants care that is tailored to the needs of people rather than those of the service provider, and proactive services that promote health and well being, not simply reactive ones that deal with the consequences of ill-health.

Can the NHS and local authorities deliver this alone? The Government thinks not. And with investment likely to slow down over the coming years, and an aging and increasingly obese population, it wants to encourage new providers into the healthcare market to stimulate innovation and drive up efficiency.

Against this background, there has been growing interest in the potential for social enterprise to play an increasingly important role in delivering health and social care. Championed by politicians of all parties and growing in confidence as a movement across the UK, social enterprise seems to offer a new way forward for health care.

The role for social enterprise

The Government already has a programme of support to encourage and support social enterprise right across the economy, which was most recently set out in its 2006 Social Enterprise Action Plan. A major strand of this work is to encourage a greater role for social enterprise in the reform of public services, as outlined in the recent Third Sector Public Services Action Plan. Our health, our care, our say built on this programme of work and highlighted social enterprises and other third sector organisations as important means of raising the quality of services. It praised their ability to develop both deeper relations with particular groups, and expert knowledge in specific areas. Social enterprise is singled out as a key instrument for unleashing public sector entrepreneurship, investing in the local community and promoting health and well-being.

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• Welcoming social enterprise into health and social care (PDF Format, 307 kb)