People power

HAVE you found yourself looking around your local neighbourhood and wishing the council or somebody else would do something about the littered park, the empty properties, the kids hanging about the streets or the isolated old people with no community events to go to? Why doesn't someone start a clean-up project, a youth club, an old people's centre?

Well, if you have some ideas, why don't you start something moving? According to social entrepreneur Andrew Mawson, it could be time for you to lead your community forward.

Lord Mawson, a former GPO worker who was made a life peer in 2007 for his innovative social regeneration work, says: It's all very well saying the council or the Government should do X,Y,Z - and likely that they won't or won't do it very well. When are you going to take responsibility?'' Lord Mawson is the epitome of the catchphrase, Power to the People. In 1984 he arrived at run-down Bromley-by-Bow in London as a minister and before long had transformed it by working with the locals, establishing a community centre providing healthcare and education, creating jobs and generating wealth to be put back into the area.

Then, in 1998 he established the Community Action Network which encourages communities to get involved in their own futures by engaging them in planning and helping them with advice, support and resources to create self-generating projects.

There are already examples in the North-East of communities doing it for themselves. Later this month, villagers in Mickleton, in Teesdale, will open their village field, bought after residents donated money and offered interest-free loans. And in Middleton Tyas, near Richmond, villagers helped raise £30,000 towards a £150,000 multi-use games area next to their new primary school. It was officially opened last summer.

Lord Mawson is adamant that it is local people who know best how to help themselves - and they don't need business acumen or an MBA from Harvard to get started.

Jamie Oliver didn't write a policy plan when he started his school dinners campaign. He spoke to dinner ladies, got in the kitchen and it spiralled from there," he says. It's that kind of culture we want to encourage. There are many people out there who care and who have great ideas and enthusiasm.

Don't be put off because you think you are not qualified, rich or famous enough to have an impact.'' Don't think you are just one small voice in the wilderness, he says, but gather people around you and watch your idea grow. He cites John Bird, founder of The Big Issue, who began it in 1991 as a little monthly paper sold to help homeless people in London. Now it is published weekly across five UK regions, as well as existing in Australia, Japan, South Africa, Namibia and Kenya. And he also is a fan of Tim Smit. No one would believe you could built a world-beating monument to the fundamental relationship between plants and humans in an old Cornish clay pit, but Smit did when he dreamt of creating the Eden Project, which has become one of the UK's top tourist attractions.

LORD Mawson believes there are multi-benefits in moving away from the culture of government handouts and encouraging individuals and groups to come up with their own ideas of what projects would be good for their area.

Self-sufficient projects can often generate business, employment and profit - the latter to be ploughed back into the community. It is a plan that has often been applied in the Third World, but not so often in our own back yard. "The maxim would be, give a man a fish and feed him for a day. Teach him to fish and you can feed him for life," Lord Mawson says.

He also believes a culture of independence from the state rather than dependence on it and socially- aware business savvy should be taught in schools, preparing young people for a future which is financially much less certain than in the past.

We now live in an enterprise culture,'' he explains.

A few decades ago people could expect a job for life with a large pension at the end of it to support them, but that is not the case now. By teaching young people these skills we can build their self respect, teach them useful business acumen, make them more employable and prepare them for the real world and, at the same time, help them take social responsibility and put something back.'' He cites a business called Green Dreams, which was set up by young people who first transformed an unloved green space in Bromley for their community and, from that, started their own landscaping business.

He says most would-be entrepreneurs are unaware of the support and funding available to them.

There are many places to go for help, especially as the business world is looking to get involved in community projects, and also various sources of finance available - even to individuals with a good idea - from sources such as the National Lottery, the Millennium Commission and UnLtd (the foundation set up to provide support and funding for social entrepreneurs).

Lord Mawson, 53, is pleased to see the breakdown in hostilities' between social work and business.

In the past there was very much a barrier between we do good work' and they are capitalist pigs' but this has changed. There are many businessmen who want to use their significant expertise in the social sector and many communities who could make good use of project management and other business-related skills and this is a good thing.'' And he says individuals, rather than big organisations, can sometimes have the greatest impact.

He tells of one small project he was involved in, where Coca-Cola donated a drinks machine to a woman in South Africa who was bringing up a number of severely-disabled children in a hut. She then sold drinks to support herself and her dependants.

All the resources of the UN had never found her,'' explains Lord Mawson, which is why he believes passionately that people should look round to their own backyard to see who or what needs help.

He has seen first hand that even the naysayers, who at first might prefer to sit back and take handouts, soon get out of their chairs and join in once the ball gets rolling. But someone has to start that ball rolling and... it could be you.

* The Social Entrepreneur, Making Communities Work, by Andrew Mawson (Atlantic Books, £9.99).

HOW TO CREATE CHANGE

1. Start doing; don't just talk. Once you have an idea, just get a plan down on a sheet of a A4 paper. You don't need to write a policy document.

2. Look for one or two people who can join you in enthusiasm to get started, people with energy who want to make things happen.

3. Then, look for people who have the skills or professional expertise you might need.

4. Get support and advice from bodies like CAN (caction.org.uk) and UnLtd, (unltd.org.uk) 5. Build a team. You don't need a committee and you don't need everyone to agree. You are the leader, after all.

6. Watch your idea grow and remember, the sky is the limit.