Podnosh

One of our earlier programmes on the Grassroots Channel was about a Birmingham based organisation called Women Acting in Todays Society. They have also been running the Women’s Empowerment Network in conjunction with b:cen.

BVSC tell me that WAITS has three jobs going: a community organiser, a BME women’s capacity builder and a Chinese women support and development worker.

Should anyone be interested you can find more details here and, unlike almost any other job applicant, you can also listen to Marcia Lewinson talking about WAITS here.

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Thanks to Sunny at Pickled Politics for this quote from Peter Horrocks, the head of BBC News at the BBC:

So, the days of middle-of-the-road, balancing left and right, impartiality are dead. Instead I believe we need to consider adopting what I like to think of as a much wider “radical impartiality” – the need to hear the widest range of views –all sides of the story.
So we need more Taleban interviews, more BNP interviews – of course put on air with due consideration – and the full range of moderate opinions. All those views need to be treated with the same level of sceptical inquiry and respect.

The notion that the views of the the BNP did not deseve the same respect and analysis as those the New Labour or any other party have always eluded me.  It is not straightforward, and the difference between lunacy and mainstream if often based on nothing more complex than how many people believe in something.

But I have always belived that the most honest way for a public (minded?) broad(narrow)caster to tackle an issue is to open it to public scrutiny. To trust the audience.
If that’s radical then it’s proof that the BBC has been far from radical for many decades. If so, what are we paying for? Mundanity?

I just wanted to mention a link I received in an email from a Friends of the Earth staffer.  It leads you to a very simple and clear page setting out the different ways individuals can support FOE.  Great example of the under rated problem of how to convert all those fresh and exciting new online relationships into active support.
Have a look:

https://www.foe.co.uk/?email_staff 

Richard Wilson at Involve has commented on the BBC’s tentative steps towards building public participation. “The BBC is stuck in 20th Century top-down parental thinking”, he says, continuing:

if the BBC really wants to support civil renewal it needs to give people the tools to make their own content without the aid of a studio or 10K camera. Yes support people understand what it takes to make a beautiful and inspiring documentary, but not in a way in which we are reliant on their filming or editing skills, but so we can do it ourselves, and eventually on our own.

My experience of BBC conversations about “user generated content” is that it is almost always perceived as something which will help create material for mainstream programming. The principal that the BBC has a role to advance democratic conversation by offering the freedom for people to have that conversation on their own terms seems to be rarely considered.Meanwhile Kevin Harris at the Neighbourhoods blog sets out some principals for wider involvement: Read the rest of this entry »

What does is take to build and nourish social cohesion? I’ve often thought the term itself has been twisted over the past year, from an expression of a neighbourhood at ease with itself to a poor short hand for tackling extremism, including home grown terror of a variety of political, religious and philosophical hues.

Tomorrow four Whitehall advisers will be in Dudley to get a better picture of how the community tackles extremism in the borough. One thing they will see is this short video we’ve produced to try and capture some of the essence of the Dudley approach.

Read the rest of this entry »

Thank you Mark.

“99 bloggers and a troubled diva walked into a publisher. The first blogger said…”.  Well, details on how a network of bloggers is supporting Comic Relief and how to buy their book Shaggy Blog Stories from  Steve Bridger at nfp2.0.

Pam Giddy at the power inquiry has been in touch to tell us about a handful of films made to challeneg the process of reforming the Lords. You can find them through these links to www.makeitanissue.org.uk.

- Alex Hardy and Phil Hall’s ‘The Road to House of Lords Reform’
- Mark Wrainwright’s ‘The Trouble with Lords’
- Duncan Tilly’s ‘House of Lords Fudge’.

Pam also sets out arguments for the adoption o fhte hayden review on party finances:

Party funding, as it exists today, gives parties less incentive to cultivate membership because they can rely on large donations, lends itself to the perception that party members have less influence than super rich donors and focuses spending at the national, rather than the local, level…..If the main parties continue to reject caps on individual donations and total spending at elections, they will knowingly allow some of the most damaging sources of disengagement to continue unchecked.

See also

Iain Dale

Stumbling and Mumbling

Political Betting

Congratulations to Sunderland for winning the government’s digital challenge, pocketing £3.5 million to develop a number of community wide digital schemes, including a video conferencing network for voluntary groups in the city, community e-champions (essential in my view to remove the fear and confusion barrier over new technology) and an emphasis on networking and empowering people.

Birmingham’s joint bid with Shropshire still comes away with some recognition. £2 million (an ‘unexpected bonus’ according to Stephen Hilton of the highly energetic Bristol bid) is being made available to a grouping of the 10 finalists in the digital challenge, mainly to allow them to spread what they are learning and encourage wider innovation.

Cllr Paul Tilsley (deputy leader of the council) said the city still has it’s own aspirations:

We are working with schools to develop the concept of ‘Universal Home Access’ which recognises the value that computers have to children’s education. Our partnership with BT is developing a street based Wi-Fi enabled city centre that will enable people with laptops, mobile phones, hand-held computers and devices with Wi-Fi, to access free public and service information from the city centre through the internet.

Like so many of the bids, the one from Birmingham/Shropshire argued for the value of real people on the ground who can share skills and enthusiasm. It’s not just about infrastructure and kit, you need individuals who can encourage people to step over the digital divide in their heads:

based on a model of community champions and brokers that will provide the support at local level to ensure that people can benefit from the digital technologies and understand how they can get the services they need with the confidence to do this.

Our experience on Valentines Day at the Digital Birmingham Marquee in Victoria sqaure was very positive. We were simply offering people a chance to record themselves and have a quick go at some audio editing (listen to some of the results here). Loads of enthusiam and most importantly lots of people telling us – “that’s easy” – which is often the case with technology when you have someone to help.

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This programme is presented by two teenagers from Highgate in Birmingham. Earlier this month Stephen Hughes and Gareth Deeming spent a day in London talking to ministers and senior civil servants about young people and the communities where they live.

They had a few minutes with Baroness Andrews and recorded their conversation on a mobile phone (they had left for London with a digital recorder – which failed on them!). This forms the core of the podcast, but in it they also explain how they want support to work with a group called SCAWDI to develop a new apprenticeship for young people.

The community apprenticeship is being designed to get young people learning through working in their community, and also expose them to a much wider range of experiences and aspirations. The plan is to lift their lives to the point where they can once again fulfill their full potential.

Some other Grassroots programmes connected with this are:

Cuckoos in a White Middle Class Nest – our first ever programme featuring Barbara Willis Brown on the work of Scawdi.
Junior Street Champions – young people working in Lozells.
The Northfield Young People’s Forum – on controlling public money.
SCAWDI – link to a b:cen briefing on the organisation.

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