All In This Together The Year the Town Hall Shrank

This programme contains some strong language.

There's going to be a revolution in this country.

Isn't only me, there's millions like me - we've had enough,

we've really had enough, and the politicians have got to realise

that we won't stand it for ever.

Summer 2011 and the austerity backlash had begun.

Police are checking CCTV footage,

after the civic centre in Stoke was attacked with paint.

The authority says it expects the repair work to cost more than £20,000.

Like hundreds of others councils Stoke on Trent have just made

the biggest cuts in a generation.

Is this democracy?

The medicine was bitter.

OK, colleagues, take the lady out.

The mood one of resentment.

We can't take much more, we just can't.

The people's levels are being eroded

and you can only take so many kicks in the teeth.

The Prime Minister kept talking about an exciting new idea.

DAVID CAMERON: 'We'll only really make things better when we all come together,

'when we all work together, when we all join together,

'when we work out that we're all in this together.

'That's the change that our country needs. It's the Big Society.'

No-one was quite clear what "the Big Society" meant,

but if it was about people taking personal responsibility,

there would never be a better time to test whether it could work.

It's not our job. We have made it clear,

we made it clear months ago, that we could not continue to support some of our facilities.

It's other people's jobs to be proactive

and come to us and, quite frankly, that's one of the big challenges.

I'm going to come in a bit lower down.

LAUGHTER

One, two, three...

CAMERA CLICKS

Mr Pervez, can I move you to the front?

Labour's Mohammed Pervez was back in power.

Let's just have a plain one, a gentle smile.

OK, good.

But who'd be a council leader in times like these?

All right?

MUSIC: "Wait A Minute" by Barbara Stephens

He'd just slashed 36 million from the city.

People had lost their libraries, care homes, bus services,

golf courses, public toilets,

and 700 council workers had lost their jobs.

-SHE SOBS

-I can't tell you.

But there was worse to come.

The leader was staring down the barrel again.

He had to find another 20 million from the city this year.

He was also still dealing with the fallout from the decisions

he'd just made.

ALL: Save our centres!

Four months ago, everyone was campaigning against the cuts.

Of all the protests, the most vocal had been led by the city's mums.

We are passionate about this campaign.

We are everyday mums and dads

and we've been given this wonderful gift of the Sure Start children's centres -

a place of safety, security, a harmonious learning environment

for the people we hold most dear in this society, our children,

and I hope that, for the future,

we will be making it into a nicer Stoke on Trent,

and not a place where we don't want to live any more. Thank you.

APPLAUSE

I would like to endorse what

Melissa says, fully.

I must congratulate you, Melissa.

With 6,000 petitioners behind them,

they'd fought the closure of seven Sure Start centres.

They supported families in some of the poorest parts of Stoke

with childcare, health, family support.

CHANTING: Save our centres!

The politicians had taken note.

They had their eyes fixed on the May local elections.

And this was a potential vote winner.

No-one wants to close facilities and neither do I.

No children's centres will close under the current proposals.

APPLAUSE

Yeah!

It was a good-news story.

I hereby declare that Mohammed Pervez is dually elected...

-APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

-Everyone seemed to have won.

But behind the headlines, an important fact had been

relegated to the small print.

That's what they said - "We have saved the 16 children's centres."

They didn't go along in that sentence, "..But..."

"we have taken away 2.25 million from their budget,

"which will be devastating to the children's centres."

As far as I'm concerned, they have used and abused our campaign to their own benefit.

I didn't think the council could be so conniving.

Right, if we're looking at it,

I'm going to take away everything we'll lose.

Numeracy will go.

No creche available for that, either. Start Up will go...

2.25 million was 30% of the children's centres' total budget.

"Fitness classes, creche available" - no chance.

ESOL will go.

Literacy will go...

The political landscape was now very different.

With the leader returned to office,

the campaigners had nothing to bargain with.

We did a kind of "that's what we're delivering now,

"and that's what we're going to deliver on 30% cuts."

We're just asking if you can reconsider the cuts.

If we could get 10% back, we could work.

The politicians, in February, at council,

made the decision that they would expect 2.25 million to be cut,

so the reality is that figure has been cut.

We know we're going to lose some services, we know that.

We're asking if you can reconsider it because 30% just seems a lot.

It's punitive.

Coming in and saying, "2.25 is too much

"and therefore we can't..." You shouldn't do it..."

That's not something we can deliver.

I'm not saying you shouldn't do it, I'm saying, "Can you reconsider from 30 to 20?"

Where's the will? That's what we want to see, the will.

Turn it round, please, turn it round.

If he did change his mind,

it meant someone else would inevitably lose out.

Wherever he went, problems seemed to follow Mohammed Pervez.

And he was about to head straight for another one.

On the horizon, a political opponent was preparing to pounce.

I'm an old-fashioned type.

When the council and police go to their respect days

and give pencils out and rubbers and soft toys, and all this...

No, I can't agree with that.

Respect has to be earned. You can't get it by giving pencils away.

Dave Conway was leader of the opposition. He didn't do spin.

He was an old-school politician.

'Once Labour, he was now a very vocal Independent.'

Why do they say you're a man that can get things done, Dave?

HE LAUGHS

Because... Well, a lot of people call me "the Rottweiler".

I'm not.

It's just I think we want the best for the people.

Once the Rottweiler had hold of something, he didn't let go.

This afternoon, I shall be asking the leader of the council...

..why we have got in such a mess.

And now he did have hold of something.

We have already been warned that we have got to save

another 20 million...

..but we are owed 20 million.

Just look at this lot. Just look at it.

20 million owed out in council tax.

We've just made a lot of people redundant.

We've closed leisure centres,

swimming pools, elderly people's homes,

and to think we've got this outstanding,

owing to the authority, it begs the question,

did we need to do what we've done

in closing these facilities that the public love?

Now, I'm saying, and I do say, that that is nothing but bad management.

If we were a private company,

we would have been in the bankruptcy court long ago.

Members of the City Council, ladies and gentlemen,

please be upstanding for the Lord Mayor of the city of Stoke on Trent,

Councillor Terry Follows.

The £20-million council tax debt stretched back 17 years.

There's something terribly wrong with this, somewhere. Terribly wrong.

Somehow, it had slipped under the radar...

until now.

On 23rd December 2010,

questions were asked on council tax still owed.

Councillor Conway had begun asking difficult questions.

Those figures...

I have no reason not to believe those figures

that are before you, Councillor Conway...

I'd like to know,

if you don't know how much it is, how d'you manage this?

Unbelievable.

-That's a colossal amount of money, isn't it?

-Absolutely.

And who hasn't been collecting?

The council tells us that every amount of money they're owed,

that they've not written off, they're still pursuing,

so, in theory, they'd like to get that 20 million back,

but obviously, it's been sat there for quite some time.

-It's gone on since 1993, Alex!

-Exactly.

What a bargain for the people of this city(!)

They've paid their way and got nowt for it.

What a cracking bargain(!)

-I don't want any of that, do you?

-Well, it's not ideal.

# Here we go

# Down that same old road The road where... #

NEWS REPORT: The Government figures mean the authority's

the worst in the West Midlands for collecting council tax.

Labour councillor Sarah Hill, who's responsible for finance, says they are working to improve...

News of the £20-million debt wasn't going down well with the public.

After suffering the biggest cuts since the war, this added insult to injury.

They really should go to town on people who don't pay their dues.

I have to pay mine. Why shouldn't everybody else?

They should be kicked out. There's no ifs, buts or ahs about it.

There's too many wishy-washy bloody liberal people about,

especially on this council.

Chase them - if they're even down the other end of the country, get 'em!

Even if it costs more, get them!

Anywhere else, you'd stand them against the wall and shoot them.

Wherever you went in Stoke, people were continuing to experience loss.

The more you heard about the missing 20 million,

the more you began to wonder how many were paying a price for the debts of others.

I'm just so angry. I'm angry because we're not getting anything.

We've got to go somewhere else, and it's only a little pool.

Well, this is...heritage.

I'm really, really angry, I am.

Yeah.

NEWS REPORT: It's the last day for two council-run swimming pools in Stoke on Trent today.

Under the authority's plans to save money, both Shilton

and Tunstall pools will shut.

Tunstall Pool was the country's oldest Victorian swimming baths.

It had survived two world wars.

But these women were enjoying their last swim.

It was closing,

saving the council £82,000 and a backlog of maintenance.

We really are upset about today,

because it's like an end of an era, isn't it?

I was taught to swim in here when I was seven, and I'm 78 now.

I've thoroughly enjoyed my lifetime in here, and I thought I would

have been able to carry on longer, but it's not to be, and that's it.

There's nothing more soul-destroying than staying in your home, not talking.

Some of these people won't talk to anyone else all week.

They're scared to go out at night, so they just come out

for their classes that they know and the people they meet.

They have a good chat.

A lot of them will just stay at home now.

They get sick, they get ill, lonely and depressed.

Ta-ra. I might see you at Fenton.

Yeah, you will. Take care!

It's a disgrace, really, ain't it?

She's crying. That's like a 70-year-old woman crying

cos she enjoys coming here and it's such a shame, it's heartbreaking.

I don't know. I can't understand it meself.

But there you go.

They say change is good, but not always, not always.

I'm just hoping some angel from heaven

will come down and save it for us.

It wasn't an angel,

but another of God's messengers - the local vicar, Father John.

-Would you be interested in coming back if we...?

-Yes.

-Ah.

-I don't think they should have closed it.

The only way the pool could be saved was if the locals ran it themselves.

But could the Big Society work in Tunstall?

-Are you going anywhere else at the minute?

-No.

-Would you come back if it re-opened?

-Definitely.

-NEWS REPORT:

-Campaigners are trying to save Tunstall Pool

and are looking to set up a trust to take it over.

Father John Starver from Christchurch says they're confident

they can find the money to run it.

Tunstall was perched in the north of the city.

It was one of the most deprived of the six towns that made up Stoke on Trent.

On all the social indicators - health, education, income -

it fell well below the city average.

Tunstall had seen better times.

Two of its most successful exports had fled some time ago.

Robbie Williams was born and bred here, but had gone to LA.

Royal Doulton, just down the road,

had relocated to China. The jobs had gone with it.

Besides the pool, there wasn't a lot left.

If I didn't do something, I would feel guilty for not,

and it's really about caring for the people in my parish

and wanting the best for them.

A girl who's seven who says, "I love swimming at Tunstall Pool.

"It would really break my heart if the pool shut.

"Every time I go on Thursday, I do 72 lengths or more, which is a lot.

"One day I'd like to swim for the county, and maybe one day for the country,

"because I really enjoy swimming and it's my greatest hobby.

"That's only if the pool stays open, so please don't shut Tunstall Pool."

3,000 people had petitioned against the closure.

It's very good, and all the rest of what you've been doing -

you've signed petitions, you've held up placards,

but the time has come for more direct action,

and what will you do to help save the pool?

Don't complain about it. Actually do something practical.

My understanding is that we've received a project proposal

from Tunstall Pool Community Trust regarding the development

of Tunstall Pool, and their proposals that have come forward.

Father John had formed a committee with three other locals

who were backing his cause.

It was their first meeting with the council.

It's quite important at this stage to put a bit of scale to this,

from a financial point of view, because you're looking at

an operation that's turning in, or was turning in,

something like over £100,000 deficit.

Just to give you a feel of the scale of the operation.

Although the council couldn't afford to run the pool itself,

it wasn't simply going to hand over the keys.

Regarding the expertise for areas like health and safety -

is that in place?

No, what we're talking about doing is not...

I'm concerned about the money, I really am concerned about the money,

because, at the moment, there is no financial backer.

They're still looking at what could be brought to the table.

How long have they got to raise money?

I would have said within the next few weeks, to start to really

lay that on the table and be able to show that that financial backing

is there, in whatever form.

So what would their costs be in the first year, roughly?

In the first year, don't absolutely quote me on this,

but you're looking at 150,000, plus.

Whichever way you turned, it was always about money.

-NEWS REPORT:

-New figures show the amount of uncollected council tax

has actually gone up by £1.25 million in the past year.

It makes Stoke on Trent one of the worst councils in England for collecting council tax.

We did ask John van de Laarschot to speak to us...

Inside the town hall, the story of Stoke's council tax deficit

had begun to snowball.

It threatened to seriously damage the council's credibility.

It was down to chief exec John van de Laarschot to sort things out.

The challenge that we've got is a pretty simple one, isn't it?

What's happening in terms of council tax collection

keeps coming up in full council, from some of our opposition politicians,

is that the trend is going the wrong way and looks out of control,

and the criticism that we continually get is,

"If you save all of that money, you wouldn't need to do any cuts."

He was paid more than £200,000 a year to make the council run more efficiently.

It was time to show he was worth the money.

Jane and I are pretty confident that we are dealing with the real current debt

in as effective a way as we can.

The big problem that we've got is that when you go back a few years,

we've got a big hump of debt there

that we need to cleanse and need to be clear about

what our tactics are about how we collect that.

So we've got £2 million that's more than six years old.

Cases where we've tried every route available to us so far,

so it's been to the bailiffs, we've tried to get attachments,

and we've still not got the debt back.

My sense is that you should push it like hell,

because if we're going with that, with our mandate for change,

and we have a piece in there which says we're not going to tolerate this that and the other,

then, actually, why should bona-fide tax payers in the city

be bailing out people that are trying to skivvy away from it?

-All right?

-OK.

All of the arguments from those people paying council tax are,

"Why are you going through all these savage savings,

"as a local authority, when all this money's out there owed to you? "Just go and get it."

There's a fair amount, I think, of public sympathy to that fact, but of course that money

that is outstanding is once-off.

The issues that we face are year-on-year-on-year basis.

So, of course, it would help

and make us look more professional and, of course, it would help us get our house in order,

but it doesn't solve all the problems. You need to do both.

So your Direct Debit is set up

but, obviously, it's just for your current year's charge...

What wasn't clear was how a council like Stoke

had allowed such an enormous debt to accumulate.

OK, now, this case is £8,712.48

-8,000?

-8,000.

-£8,000?

-Yes.

-In debt to the council?

-Yes, £8,700.

-Is that unusual, that amount?

-No.

How many cases do you see a year, then?

Thousands.

We look at them daily.

This is all we do, is look at people who haven't paid.

We give them chance after chance after chance.

I mean, the council keep on, "We're all in this together."

We are, until you've got to pay, and then there's some who will and some who won't.

Oh, yeah - they come up with all sorts of excuses to avoid paying.

One of the main ones is, "I've been on holiday

"and I've spent all me money on my holiday,

"so I've got none left and I can't pay you."

Speaking to people, they say, "I've got other debts,"

and when you say to them, "This is a priority debt,"

they'll say, "To me it isn't, cos I've got other debts to pay."

He's got a debt of £4,811.

Extremely high.

We wanted to try and understand why the council's collection rate

was amongst the worst in the country.

It used several bailiff companies to chase down the unpaid money.

Dukes was one of them.

I did want to be a prison officer...

but my partner refused bluntly to let me go ahead and do that,

so I said, "I'll be a bailiff instead, then."

SHE LAUGHS

He didn't look pleased, but I said, "It's either one or the other,"

so he says, "Go ahead and do that, if that's what you want to do."

-So I...

-D'you keep him in line?

-Yes.

SHE LAUGHS

27-year-old Keeley was new to debt collecting.

She was the only female bailiff working for Dukes.

This gentleman owes 5,000, near enough...

..going back to 2001.

Hello.

Yo!

It's Keeley from Dukes Bailiffs.

From what?

Dukes Bailiffs. About your outstanding Council Tax at the property.

What do you want?!

-They're following me.

-I don't care!

I need to talk to you about your outstanding Council Tax.

-Do you?

-Yes.

-Go on, I'll talk to you out there.

You know you have a large sum outstanding for quite a period of time now?

Cos I've got no money.

Well, you've not paid any for quite some time,

and if you've got no money and you're receiving benefits...

I don't receive nothing.

So you're not receiving absolutely anything?

Nothing... Honestly.

But you still need to pay your Council Tax, then.

Since 2006, I've not claimed.

Right, OK.

But you still need to pay your Council Tax.

OK.

So how are you proposing to pay this if you're telling me you've got no money?

-I'll have to get a job, won't I?

-Yeah, because, at the moment, you've got £8,000 outstanding.

Not eight...five.

What else does everybody fucking... Am I on stage?

And you wanted to discuss this on your front...

I won't go away, this won't go away.

You can't come again.

I can, because I've already done that.

-All right?

-Well, come and take this letter from me, then.

I will come back through, sir...

Excuse me.

-Oi! Get out of my house!

-I'm already in.

Get out. No, I'm sorry, you have just helped yourself...

I know I have to invite you into my house...

No, you don't. If you left the door open I can walk in.

My door was shut!

No, the door was left unlocked.

Was my door shut?

It was shut but it's left unlocked. I can't go away, this is me job.

I'm a bailiff. You need to sort that out now, and if you're

not telling the council that you've got no income, you're going to still

keep getting your Council Tax charges, year after year.

It's going to keep going on and you're going to end up owing more and more.

The man had received nine court summons over the last ten years.

During that time, he'd never told the council he was out of work.

In a city where one-in-four was unemployed,

getting people to pay wasn't simple.

But cases like this only told part of the story.

And how are you in a position to pay this at the moment

cos it's almost £2,000?

I know. I'm going to sort it out.

I'm just trying to... juggle everything.

Right. Is this your car?

My husband's.

Your husband's car. Both work?

-Mm-hm.

-Yeah.

Got to pay your Council Tax... can run a BMW(!)

-You've got behind with the Council Tax over a couple of years.

-Yeah.

How did that happen?

I don't know - I just kept forgetting to pay.

It just went all pear-shaped,

totally forgot to pay this, that and the other.

My husband is responsible for all the bills. He pays them all online.

As far as I was aware he'd been paying them,

so, it's a mystery to me. I've just rung him

and said, "What's all this about?" and he says, "I haven't a clue."

-I think it stretches back two years.

-Does it?

Yeah, I think it's £3,500.

Yeah.

What was beginning to emerge was that,

while there were those who couldn't pay, there were a large number who wouldn't...

if they could get away with it.

They weren't people who'd missed the odd month. In some cases

the non-payments went back years.

I pay my Council Tax. I'm a home owner.

It's mandatory to pay it.

If you've got the money to pay it,

if you work, then you should be paying your Council Tax.

Does it make you a bit cynical about...people?

Yes... Very.

Because they just try and get away with everything.

So, even the cases that are genuine, you have this nag at the back

of your mind that they're not being completely honest with you.

Watching Keeley do her job

had started to reveal something important.

Keeley from Dukes Bailiffs, about outstanding Council Tax.

It wasn't simply a question of money.

It was also about our sense of civic responsibility.

If more people had paid their dues, maybe seven months on,

the children's centres' mums wouldn't still be campaigning out on the streets.

I just love rain(!)

I think it's going to be a thing. Has everybody got petitions...?

I have left my husband. I'm now bringing up two children.

My stepmum has to help me. She had a nervous breakdown 18 months ago.

If it wasn't for the Sure Start centre, she wouldn't go anywhere.

So it touches everybody, but you're on about cutting it.

Because the cuts to the children's centres were so big,

the council was legally obliged to talk to families

about exactly which services should go.

Meetings were taking place across the city.

But all the users wanted was for the council to change its mind.

We're no longer in a debate as to whether it's a 20% cut or a 30% cut.

It's actually a 30% cut that has been made.

How you decide which services you offer

is very much a part of this consultation -

that's why we're listening.

I'm sure, somewhere, they could scrape back 10%,

somewhere, to save all them activities and them jobs from going.

I'm worried that, with the cuts you're not going to be able to reach

the families that need the help the most, like me.

I had postnatal depression, didn't leave the house,

and it makes me wonder whether, if you don't reach them,

you'll end up paying out more in the future, because the kids will be

taken off them, be took into care, because they're not looked after,

because if it wasn't for my centre I wouldn't have my kids at all,

they'd be gone - I'd probably still be sat at home, doing nothing...

It's really difficult.

Other questions...?

'Publicly, the council leader was similarly uncompromising.

'But behind the scenes, there were signs he was starting

'to question the council's position.'

Can you actually give them £750,000 back?

Erm...

Look, it depends on what is it that they want in terms of services.

It's not strictly about money, it's about...

If they can prove there are certain services

which are really desperately needed for those communities -

the very deprived communities and the most vulnerable people,

then we could potentially look very seriously

at trying to say, "OK, we're not going to get rid of those services."

But if you cut... If you gave them 10% back...

you'd have to lose 10% from somewhere else.

Well, we'd have to find that 10% from somewhere else

and, of course, don't forget we've already got

£20 million worth of cuts to make because of the second year

of the financial settlement we got from Government,

and there will be then an additional £750,000 we would have to find,

so it's a huge challenge.

MUSIC: "Trust In Me" by The Foster Brothers

The body of Christ.

Business is difficult, life is difficult.

But you can make it as easy as you want or as difficult as you want.

The body of Christ.

I don't need to work, but I work because I'm excited

about getting up every day.

It gives me a purpose in life.

We've got a meeting this afternoon with Mo Chaudry,

a local businessman who runs WaterWorld,

which is one of the largest water parks in the UK.

We're looking for his experience and his expertise, which is invaluable, but the money's important.

'Mo Chaudry was a rare breed in Stoke -

'a man with money, and lots of it.

'The Sunday Times Rich List once said Mo was worth 58 million...'

Mo, do you know how much you're worth?

HE LAUGHS

No, I've no idea.

Best thing, if he got his cheque book out and signed a blank cheque, that'd be great.

Mo had had run-ins with the city council in the past,

but a big pledge from him

would demonstrate that the residents were serious.

-How are you doing? I'm Mo.

-Hi, I'm Richard...

When I took this business on, 12 years ago, I brought it from Rank Leisure.

They were a top-hundred company, and people said, "It's not possible

"to make money on a water-based commercial facility."

I'm still here after 12 years,

and I'm proud to say we've made money every year since then.

Mo's business CV was impressive.

But what Father John was searching for was a chance to ask him

about money...

He's got to have a return on investment.

Shall I show you inside now?

..And whether they could have some.

Before we go into the business plan

and start to scrutinise, maybe just set the scene, really.

Basically, your objective is to develop this Big Society initiative.

Take some leadership to try and get it going.

What makes you think you can actually pull it off - what's so good about it?

It's a family pool.

The staff were always very friendly.

I certainly think one of the USPs

is it's one of the oldest Victorian pools in the country that's still open. Lots of them have been closed.

Cash is king. So, where's your cash and what's your cash position?

Obviously, over the time it builds up year-on-year, obviously, there is that initial problem...

Where's your working capital? How much have you got?

-Not a huge amount.

-None at the moment.

But we're in the process of, partly by talking to

people like your good self...

HE LAUGHS

How much working capital do you need? Have you estimated?

I've estimated about £100,000, just to open the door.

If you need a hundred grand to trade, working capital,

you must have 150 to 200,000.

So you've got that little buffer?

That will help you trade through your bad times.

I'm not going to focus too much on your sales and marketing.

With respect...that's waffle.

It's much more difficult to deliver.

There's things like portable appliance testing

you haven't covered. Fire alarm, you haven't covered.

Security system, you haven't covered. Then there's your buildings insurance,

your contents insurance,

your loss-of-business interruption insurance,

your trustee insurance...

in case you mess up and they come after you.

-You wouldn't want that now, would you?

-No.

I think it's all about believability.

And the next phase of your PR has got to be about believability.

You're going to deliver this, not just a bunch of people with different backgrounds.

Do-gooders.

OK, do-gooders...who are not living in the real world.

Mo hadn't promised any money,

but he recognised that what Father John was trying to do

represented something bigger than just the re-opening of a swimming pool.

It'll set the tone for what comes next.

It'll be a precedent.

And I think it's a perfect opportunity...

to actually assess this "Big Society" that the Government are on about,

and then, ultimately, it's a leap of faith.

The fact of the matter is, they've closed it, it's history,

so why not give a new team of people

an opportunity to resurrect something for the good of the community,

and if it doesn't work, what actually have they lost?

Mo had decided to kick-start the fundraising.

He'd offered Father John free use of his water theme park

to stage an event.

If they sold enough tickets, they could raise £10,000.

We've got some tickets for WaterWorld.

It's going to be on Saturday, 10th September.

It's at night - at seven till nine.

Now, we've got a minimum donation of £10, but we're asking people

if they can afford to, even if it's 11, 12,

because the more money we make off the tickets, obviously, that all goes into the pot.

Obviously, things are going to be different to what they were

when it was run by the City Council.

Being run by the community hopefully brings some community spirit

together, as well - a bit of pride.

And a lot about this project is

obviously keeping the pool, or re-opening the pool for community use

but also actually having the community involved,

coming to do their bit for Tunstall.

As we said on the posters, it's your pool.

It's very much in your hands to support it, as well.

In a way, the WaterWorld function is the litmus test.

That really is going to help understand if the people of Tunstall

really care enough to get off their backsides to turn up

for a community-based event, to fundraise.

I would say that they need to get a minimum of 500.

If they get a minimum of 500, it proves something to me

that the community do value the Tunstall Pool, and want to resurrect it.

The money was gradually trickling in -

they were up to £5,500.

And there was talk of the council matching whatever the group raised.

Things were moving in the right direction.

Hi, I'm looking for Mr Bailey.

Yeah, he's just upstairs. Do you want to come in?

Yes, please.

Hi, is it Brian Bailey? Hi, it's Keeley from Dukes Bailiffs...

about unpaid Council Tax that you've got at the property.

Do you mind if I take a seat and I'll just make some notes?

I mean, I was working until last year, but they finished me off.

Do you know how much you owe now?

Well, it says 900-and-odd on there. Don't know what it...

Your total debt outstanding at the moment is near enough 8,000.

I didn't think it was that much.

You've got ten years' worth of Council Tax on here.

HE MUTTERS INDISTINCTLY

-Did you know it was that much?

-No.

Why haven't you paid it?

I just forgot, I just forget things.

For ten years?

I thought I'd sorted it and got up to...

I don't know.

I can leave some money with you. I can pay £40 now and £40 every week.

£40 a week - it's not prudent for me

to put you on an arrangement of that kind of length.

I suggest you phone our office and make token payments,

because I can't put you on an arrangement for £40 a week.

With the amount of money you've got outstanding,

I would need a substantially lot more than that per week.

It's just because of the amount, how long this has gone on for - over ten years.

Mr Bailey had ignored dozens of council letters, phone calls

and court summons.

That seems that's the first bailiff contact he's had,

for not paying his Council Tax for ten years.

He's had no other contact other than letters. It's easy to just

put letters to one side and just bury your head about it, as many do.

There's no repercussions, is there?

No, no, there's no cut-off.

It's not like with rent, they can evict.

There just doesn't seem to be

any particular repercussion, as you say, for not paying your Council Tax.

And all Keeley had come away with was a promise that a man

who'd paid virtually nothing since 2001 would get in touch with the council.

As a bailiff, Keeley had the power to take away people's possessions...

but only if the council gave her permission.

We've got the liability holder from the council.

They want us to go and recover the money by lawfully enforcing the debt.

Then we get to the point when we can enforce, and then the council

don't want us to enforce, they don't want to grant uplift to remove goods,

so then, do the council actually want the money back, or not?

£20 million remained unpaid across the city of Stoke-on-Trent.

But it seemed that was partly of the council's own making.

It made all the right noises about getting the money back,

but, out on the streets, there was a danger it appeared a soft touch.

John, do you think the council's been robust enough

in chasing this debt?

Have you been maybe a bit toothless?

You know, if residents don't see that there's a deterrent,

they'll just put the next council letter in the bin.

There's been a lot of things to sort out in this local authority,

and the approach we've taken is one that needs to be a little more firm.

I've got feedback from speaking to some bailiffs

that are working for the city council

that felt the council was a bit hesitant

about using the tools to go after the money,

a little bit scared, because of how the council would be perceived.

Do you feel that's been the case in the past?

I'm not sure.

I think that's a conversation to have with elected members.

My sense is, um...

More specifically, they won't take possessions from people's houses.

Is that what they're saying? It's a difficult call, isn't it?

You know, in a city

where we've got massive levels of deprivation and so on,

you've got to be sensitive about it.

But, you know, we need a policy call, don't we, from the local authority

-that says either we are or we aren't.

-For won't-payers?

Yeah, for won't-payers.

And, you know, my recommendation will be that we push for it,

and I think you'll get a lot of general public support

that that's the right thing to do.

The public might well support

a more aggressive approach from the council.

But in the 17 years since the council tax was introduced,

no-one in Stoke had ever gone to prison for failing to pay.

No, I'm not confirming anything.

I'm just showing you that you can't touch that vehicle...

Now, in austerity Britain,

was it really the time for the council to start playing hard ball?

I'm not working now. I lost my job,

so as far as this whole thing is concerned, I'm absolutely annoyed.

Do you want your letter back? Or are you coming back out?

Even in the wealthier parts of Stoke,

people were defaulting on payments.

I don't see at the moment how I can go forward from this

because, as I say, he doesn't own the car.

He hasn't actually got a job at the moment,

and they are very much living beyond their means.

To think that the Government can think of doing this,

but have they actually walked into the children's centres

and asked people what it's done for them,

asked them where they were a year ago and where they are now?

They've never done that.

They've never asked, they've never been to us and asked those questions,

you know, they've never been through the doors.

It had been almost a year

since Melissa launched the campaign to save Stoke's children's centres.

While other protestors had come and gone, she'd kept on fighting.

But now things were out of her control.

The users of the children's centres are very concerned

about the level of cuts.

But we're under huge financial pressure,

so we have to strike a balance

of having shown that we've listened

to the users of the children's centres during the consultation

and also trying to achieve

as much of the savings as possible.

They were asking Council Leader Pervez to give back

three-quarters of a million pounds.

He'd called a special meeting of the cabinet.

What we're talking about here

is actually a significant reduction of services

from those children's centres,

in some cases to the point where they're only open one day a week,

which puts their future in jeopardy, to say the least.

Well, it's not ideal. Ideally, we'd have loads of money to spend however we pleased

and we wouldn't have to be looking down this road

and doing different things.

But, you know, we've got these cuts...

VOICE FADES INTO BABBLE OF VOICES

As we know, you've put a huge amount of time

and effort into the campaign.

Do you regret it now?

No, I would never... Don't do anything

if you're going to regret it.

I look back at that campaign,

I look at how it brought all the parents

from all the children's centres across Stoke on Trent together,

because those people fought.

They worked hard...

The proposals on the table in essence leave us

£750,000 short this year. We've got a budgetary challenge

going into next year of approximately £20 million,

so this is not an easy amount to throw away

because we're going to need to find it a little later on.

There's another debate going on about early-intervention work

to prevent youth from getting involved in criminality and so on.

How do we defend our decision, then, to be cutting services

which are sort of early-intervention related?

It's not easy and there's a lot of decisions here...

DAVID CAMERON: 'I want other forward-thinking, entrepreneurial,

'community-minded people AND neighbourhoods in our country

'to come forward and ask for the same freedoms and the same support.

'If you've got an idea to make life better,

'if you want to improve your local area, don't you just think about it.

'Tell us what you want to do,

'and we will try and give you the tools to make this happen.'

-Do you want to do the talking?

-No, you can do the talking, yeah.

Hi, there. Have you got a minute?

Have you got 30 seconds? No? Fair enough.

A month had passed

since Father John launched the swimming pool fundraiser.

But the people of Tunstall hadn't responded.

Just 25 of the 1,000 tickets had been sold.

Did you ever go to Tunstall Pool?

No, I don't go.

You go to Fenton? Why do you go to Fenton rather than...?

Fenton's better than Tunstall.

I mean, when we went along to the meeting with Mo,

obviously it was his idea to, you know, do that as an event

and he said, "Oh, yes, you should be able to get people

"to spend £10. If you sell 1,000 tickets, that's 10 grand."

But I think perhaps we didn't really appreciate

that people weren't prepared

to actually spend a tenner on, if you like, a one-off event.

Yes, I mean, up until that point,

we thought we had all the support we needed.

And then it appeared that we don't.

It's now time for the community to do its bit.

If the pool is going to reopen,

then local people have got to come and support it,

and it's putting a letter out saying, you know,

this is that sort of make-or-break time,

that if there aren't enough people who actually are prepared

to come back to the pool once it reopens,

then perhaps it's a bit of a non-starter.

Maybe the pool wasn't quite as important to the community

as Father John had thought.

But was that the failure of the Big Society

or the failure of the people of Tunstall,

a town that perhaps no longer cared?

To save anything in this city, you needed to show fight.

It was something the children's centre mums had never lacked.

NEWSREADER: 'Cuts to children's centres in Stoke on Trent

'are going to be less severe than planned.

'The city council now wants to cut their budgets by 20%

'instead of 30%. 11 teaching jobs will go,

'but the council says centres won't close

'and opening hours won't be drastically reduced.'

The victories had to be savoured...

because they were likely to be short-lived.

It's been a long year.

Yeah!

It has been a long year, but we've got through it

and, you know, we're all happy.

I can sit here...

I can stand here now and watch my child playing out there

and, you know, like I said, I'm still on the children's centres

and I've got every intention that the children's centres

will stay here because I know,

I'm not thinking of fighting next year, but I know if they say

they're going to close the children's centres,

it'll be another battle next year

because I won't let it happen.

You know, I'm that kind of person.

It had been a long year for Mohammed Pervez too.

Ah, Maureen is here.

What happens when you come to look at the budget and children's centres again in a few months' time?

Then we've got all those difficult questions to answer again.

Is it a bit like a stay of execution?

You just kind of...

you know they've got to close eventually, some of them?

There's going to be ongoing pressure

on everything that we're doing across the board,

children's centres included.

He might have been the leader,

but he was a man with very little power,

making cuts whether he liked it or not.

We approved a budget of £36 million in February this year.

We have so far implemented 80% of those cuts,

and even then it was quite painful for our communities.

And now we're here today

to discuss how we are going to take out a further £28 million.

I cannot possibly see that we are going to be able to do this,

this year or next year, without touching any frontline services.

What we'd witnessed over the past 12 months wasn't unique to Stoke,

it was happening everywhere.

The politicians told us we were on a hard road,

but in the end, it would lead to a better future.

But the journey was already painful, and we were only at the start.

This was the just the first year of cuts.

How many more were to follow?

DAVID CAMERON: 'The change we need in our country

'is recognising that we'll only really make things better

'when we all come together, when we all work together,

'when we all join together, when we work out

'that we're all in this together.

'That's the change that our country needs. It's the Big Society.'

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