As the snow and ice clears, MIKE HAYNES, a professor at the University of Wolverhampton Business School in Telford, examines the impact of the harsh winter weather.

Did you fall in the snow? Did you slip? Did you curse the pavements in Shropshire that had not been cleared? But did you clear your own?

If not, you may want to think about what David Cameron’s “Big Society” really means, for the snow that we were battling with tells an interesting tale.

The Coalition’s argument is simple: Let government retreat and the public and private sector will step in. But in the snow there was little sign of that as people stumbled and slipped on uncleared paths throughout the county.

It wasn’t always like this. It is not romantic to recall a time when people throughout Britain felt that they had a duty to be good neighbours and clear the snow from the fronts of their houses. But now it seems most of us do nothing. After all, we say, if they don’t bother why should I? In turn our neighbours say “if you don’t bother then why should we?”

And it’s not just householders. The same applies to many shopkeepers. Working in a shop in the late 1960s I can remember that it was taken for granted that younger members of staff would be out there clearing the snow to make life easier for customers. But this seems to be a dying tradition in Britain.

In some countries it still happens – because it is not just considered a duty, but the law. In Germany, for example, householders must clear the snow from their houses. It is not that hard to move fresh snow.

“It takes ten minutes,” said one German, and then everyone’s life is easier – but only if we all do it.

The trouble is that the Big Society idea depends on people voluntarily co-operating.

But we are also told to follow our self interest. And that is the problem.

We don’t believe that we can, or should, trust one another. If I am a good neighbour and clear the snow and you slip, you may even sue me as so many people seem to believe.

Selfishness does not seem a good basis on which to organise our lives. But once the pursuit of self interest becomes the basis of life, all sorts of perverse things happen.

This soon raises a question about whether the Big Society can ever work. Before Christmas, a Financial Times survey revealed that while people in Britain claimed to give money willingly to charity they were much more reluctant than people in most other countries to give up something more precious — their position and their time.

If you have been gridlocked in the snow in one of Telford’s shopping centre car parks during the past few weeks, you will know how counter productive a “me first” view is, but you will also know also how difficult it is to change it.

If you have not been caught in a gridlock yet and are thinking of going to the sales, then be warned.

A simple trip to Sainsbury’s on the Forge Retail Park at Telford some days ago resulted in the Shropshire’s Star’s Shirley Tart having a two-hour wait to get out. She was not alone. I was stuck too as drivers coming in rushed and blocked roundabouts so that none of us could get out. The problem was made worse by the slippery exits which none of the stores thought it their duty to clear.

A simple bit of traffic control would have helped, but no-one wanted to do it until one young mother, a passenger in a car, jumped out in frustration and started directing traffic in and out. Within 20 minutes we were free as she stopped the cars coming in blocking the cars coming out.

But having done her duty and jumped in her car so that she could drive off, the previous difficulties took hold again and the car park began to seize up once more.

So does the Big Society work? Quite a few people thanked the good Samaritan motorist for help. Others looked puzzled — who was this strange person who was directing traffic?

The trouble is that you can’t run the world that way. You can’t clean Shropshire’s streets on charity and goodwill in a world in which we all believe in following our narrow self interest.

You can’t even get in and out of a car park in Telford that way. You need some traffic lights, some regulations, and some – let us say this word – “government”.

A volunteer society of Shropshire snow cleaners or traffic controllers will not do the work for us.