Friday High Five – what Gordon Brown said in Manchester last night about community spirit

The first week back after the summer has felt busy and more urgent.

On Thursday night I was fortunate to be at a live event with the former Prime Minister Gordon Brown at New Century Hall in Manchester.

What a colossus he is.

His life post-politics has been about public service and contributing to long term thinking.

With a new book to promote he spoke about the importance of community organisations providing social cohesion all over the world, as an alternative to naked individualism, and social isolation.

He links the fracturing of the rules-based order to the erosion of civic life, which has led to an epidemic of loneliness, a loss of community spirit and a growing sense that there is nowhere to turn in times of need, no common cause worth fighting for.

Drawing on decades of experience at the heart of politics, alongside new research and original polling of nearly 100,000 people across forty-five countries, he reveals how global instability and civic decline are connected, but suggests a practical and hopeful roadmap to bring us back together.

In this I think business potentially has an important role to play. People may not be members of unions, churches and community groups like they once were, but so many of us define ourselves by where we work, and the collective efforts we often make with colleagues for the common good.

You see this in community volunteering days, and charity events, and mentoring of young people in our local schools and colleges.

It is an idea I’d like to explore how over the coming weeks.

Anyway, we are also part of a community that can achieve far more than making money for the the organisations we work for.

This week has also served to rekindle our sense of purpose.

As journalists, some of the news we bring you is what we call ‘on diary’ – they are important updates, but they’re unlikely to be exclusive to us. This week these include Garry Bridges being elected as the new leader of Manchester City Council, and Emily Mathew being promoted to chief executive at the North West Leadership Team.

Others like this include stock market company news like the confirmed acceptance of an offer for Macclesfield-headquartered heat treatment giant Bodycote.

But the stories that get our pulses racing are digging out something new; a story that doesn’t otherwise get told, and some people would rather it wasn’t told at all. Quite often these days, you’re very lucky to get any kind of response from the parties involved.

Private companies are strangely coy about discussing their financial results. Take SJM, the concert promoters behind the Oasis comeback tour of 2025, and hundreds of other shows. They made a decent profit, their income soared – supersonic, even – over the course of the year, but what do they have to say about that? Not much.

Same with Britannia Hotels, known as the worst hotel chain in the country. They’re just not bothered what anyone has to say about them and they get on with the business of running their hotels for customers and the Home Office.

Thanks to some excellent new tools we’re also getting access to legal cases that have previously gone unreported. Carlisle-based Svella Group is suing Virgin Media, and we found a judgment related to the case and reported it this week. The original case may be old, but no-one reported it. So, like the question of whether a tree falls in the forest, has justice been done is it’s not seen or heard being done. When it comes to the law, the term ‘in the public domain’ is frankly ridiculous.

In the meantime, have a great weekend.