In Conversation with Mark Ashton Episode 2 - Raw Recording

Mark Ashton, former Mayor of Cambridge, discusses his role and the communities he engaged with during his term. He talks about his background and how he became a councillor and eventually the Mayor. Mark is proud of the work he did for two local charities, Cambridge Aid and Romsey Mill. He also mentions attending various events and engaging with different communities in Cambridge, such as the Muslim, Bangladesh, Chinese, and Hong Kong communities. As the Mayor, Mark's influence was limited as the role is ceremonial. However, he used his position to raise awareness about the inequality in Cambridge and advocate for change. Mark believes that reaching out to communities, especially young families, at an early stage is essential. He suggests providing information and support to families through schools and early interventions. Mark also mentions the increasing responsibilities on teachers, who are now expected to take on social work duties as well. This has led to some teachers feeling ov Welcome to In Conversation, podcast of the Rudd Centre, University of Cambridge, where we promote research, training and policy engagement to meet the needs of families and children. I'm Ali and today I'm joined by Susie from the Rudd Centre and Mark Ashton, who was Mayor of Cambridge from 2022 to 23. Today we're going to be talking about his role as Mayor and the communities and needs that he's encountered within the city. So Mark, can you tell us a little bit about yourself? Can you tell us about your progression into the role of Mayor? Yes, first of all, good morning and welcome everybody. I hope you find this quite interesting. Yeah, I'm from the north of England, as you can guess by my accent. I came to Cambridge 52 years ago for a job, never wanted to stop in Cambridge, but as life does, I've stopped here ever since. I have two grown up children, one who's moved back to the north of England and one who's a teacher up in Rutland. I've been married for 51 years now. I worked in the food industry when I came to Cambridge, working in the abattoirs. We have three abattoirs in Cambridge and then moved on to the larger food industry as a technical advisor and then a key account sales manager and a divisional sales manager. I've always been interested in politics, but my life meant I was too busy to spend actual time and I always wanted to be a person who was an advocate rather than somebody who just had a title. So I became a councillor 12 years ago for the ward where I've lived ever since I came to Cambridge, which is Cherryington. For 12 years I've been a labour and cooperative councillor. To become the Mayor of Cambridge, you have to be a councillor. I never saw myself as a man with the chains. I saw myself as a man representing the people, but then I'm a man of faith as well and then I had this, in a sense, voice that said it's not about you, it's about what you can do as well and you can be in a position where you can go and encourage people and try and influence people as well. So I put my name forward to be the Mayor of Cambridge and then utterly surprised, I was nominated and got unanimous support to be the Mayor of Cambridge. So I was the Mayor of Cambridge for 12 months and I stood down in May. So that's where I am at the moment. And what are you proud of achieving during your mayoral term? Proud of achievements? Well, I have to have two charities as the Mayor and that's very difficult to pick just two charities from the amazing charities that are in Cambridge. There are so many well-deserving charities, but the two that I picked were local charities. One was called Cambridge Aid, which surprisingly has been going 140 years and nobody had heard of and so lifting their profile has been amazing and going to some events they've done as well and promoting them, really proud of and sitting on the trustees' meetings as well to see where the money goes to. And then the other one was Romsey Mill, which has been going not quite as long and Romsey Mill looks at how they can support young people, young families and making sure they don't fall into that life of debt, which leads to other things as well. So raising their profile and raising money for them, I think if I want to be proud, yes, I'm proud of what I've done for those two charities and I still got my links with Cambridge Aid and Romsey Mill as well and I will continue to promote them wherever possible. How have you engaged with various communities throughout Cambridge? As the Mayor, you get invited to lots of different events. So you get the biggest civic events from the university like the honorary degrees to the more, I would say, pleasurable ones where you go and meet the smaller charities as well, where you go and present the awards. So I've met with the Muslim community, the Bangladesh community, the Chinese community, the Hong Kong community and it's been a privilege to go along and see that they're part of this wonderful city we've got and we are a city that does encompass everybody. So yeah, my role in a sense has been to try and make sure that I could meet as many people who wanted to meet the Mayor as possible and also invite people to the Guildhall to see the workings of the Guildhall. So we had a couple of Scout and Cub groups who came and sat in the Council Chamber and saw how politics works first hand as well and they enjoyed that as well. Could you provide an example of policy influence that you have achieved? The influence is very different because the Mayor of Cambridge is a ceremonial role and not a, in a sense, political role like you have the combined Mayor of Peterborough and Cambridge or the Mayor of London who do have power to make policy. As the Mayor of Cambridge, he did have a lot of power years and years ago but over the years, that's been stripped away and maybe rightly so because we did have a famous mayor who caused a lot of problems so we won't go into that but that was in the 1800s. So my role has been the ceremonial role where to go around and like I say, just encourage people, influence people and where I do meet with people of influence to remind them that Cambridge is the most unequal city and it is surprising that in this intellectual city that we still have a lot of people who go, I can't believe we're the most unequal city. How can that be? And then to describe certain wards like Abbey Ward, King Edges Ward and say to those people, go and have a look for a stand, go and speak to those people around there, speak to the councillors, speak to the charities like Red End who were involved in those wards as well and you'll get a flavour of what's needed and the proof that we are the most unequal city and that is a shame really because Cambridge is worldwide known for the famous intellectual and here we are having to say we're the most unequal city. How can that be right? How can we try and change that? And in a lot of cases it's not massive steps, it's small steps and those small steps make the difference and there's that famous saying, the walk of 10,000 miles begins with one step and if we all take that one step together, what a difference we can make in this city. Mark, can I just quickly ask a question about communities that you've reached in Cambridge because you have done amazing work in the time that you were Mayor at Cambridge and I'm aware from other conversations that we've had that you continue to do really good work and really impactful human work. Who would you say within the Cambridge community are the hardly reached communities that you've had more contact with and what could be done to reach them? I think they are the reached communities sometimes, they are the young families, the mums I went over to a public event and it's just hard to see young families who were struggling for basic things, who don't seem to be able to reach out. So on one hand we have organizations that are offering everything and come to us and families who don't know how to engage with them and I think there's a big lesson that we need to be able to find a simpler way of engaging with people at an early stage. We're living in this digital age where everybody is Googling on the phone and yet we've got people who can't seem to reach the agencies that can help them and want to help them as well and maybe ideas such as when they start school there's a letter provided in that basic list of what they get to say, here's some organizations to get in touch with. It's no shame just to reach out to have a chat about things as well and start that learning how to budget and early aid because budgeting is key and it's something I struggle with as a young family as well and a young married person as well and if you don't start that budgeting earlier the spiral then just moves on. So I think key is reaching out at an early stage before people find themselves too far down the line. One of the key research areas of the Red Centre has been looking at early interventions for families and for children and one of the key things that we are looking at at the moment actually is looking at training but training for frontline professionals but people who wouldn't necessarily have the time and the ability to commit to full-time a three-year training course. Do you think that if professionals such as teachers, social workers, charity workers, if they had somebody who came in and offered them a conversation, look this is something, somebody maybe like yourself, you could say I've seen this, this is where the need is. Do you think that that would be of value? Have you seen that in Cambridge? I can speak about teachers and their role nowadays because my daughter is a primary school teacher and has been for over 20 years and it's really saddening to see that she loves the job as teaching but sees herself more as a social worker now because what's happening is there's more and more emphasis on the teachers looking for the at-risk pupils so she has to do an amazing amount of work and obviously she won't even tell her dad but there's an amazing amount of work at the at-risk registers and she was saying the time it takes up actually being a social worker not a teacher and I don't know if that's the government policy where they found it cheaper to say do you know what we'll put that on the teacher now and then we don't have to have the social workers the same as well but then again you neglect the teaching part as well to a certain degree and it's no wonder sometimes a lot of teachers are going I came to teach not to be a social worker, that's not my, what I want to do in life. I want to be a social worker and I've been a social worker and I think that's another key area where why are teachers leaving? It's not just the pay, it's the actual what the job is entailing now as well and when you've had teachers like my daughter over 20 years now who's saying to me for the first time ever dad do you know what maybe it's time for me to look at whether I want to carry on teaching and she's never wanted to be anything else but a teacher she's turned down the chances to be the headmistress and mum and dad were very proud when she said she'd been offered that and of course I turned it down because I'm a teacher, I'm not a manager if I wanted to be a manager had I done what you did dad so again you've got teachers who've been moved into managerial roles not teaching roles so it's an area I think where we need to look closely at how we actually structure what we're doing and that's key on those steps again to say how do we reach the vulnerable people, how do we give them the best aid, how do we give them the best steps. Yes and funnily enough it's a conversation that we have with quite a number of teachers in the Red Centre and a number of teachers and teaching groups have come to us and said you know please we know that you've offered training in other areas before but is there something that you could offer that would help support us because what they're finding is that those key junctures in a child's life so transition periods as well so primary school what I would call secondary school or further on there are these needs these mental well-being and support needs for the child but also for the parents and so we're hearing this this is definitely something that we're hearing within our group and something that we would like to be able to support so it's very interesting that you should you should say that and is it something obviously your daughter she's a teacher but is it something that you've seen within the city of Cambridge as well? I've heard other people say to me the same thing as well yeah and we've got friends whose daughters are teachers as well and they're expressing the same concerns that they're not teaching anymore there's more social work and and if I say how do we get that balance how do we get that balance and I think like I say it's not just one aspect of the teaching it's the other aspects of the parents as well and that's why Ron Zimmel do a great job of saying reaching out to young parents and so I was pleased when I could go to these the young families as well and talk about budgeting so they see a man with the big chains on and say I struggled I had a credit card I had to get the credit card in half I couldn't make ends meet don't be ashamed about it get the pencil get the paper out see those organisations get working on it as well so I think people being honest about we look at somebody and we don't see where they've come from we don't see how that's evolved as well so people will come to my house and say oh what a lovely house and garden and I say that's 40 years in the making it's not an overnight success and I think that's where we are we're making this an equal city a better city for everybody a fairer city for everybody is that we have to make those steps and continue making the steps as well I think sometimes we think we can have one policy that will make it right overnight with magic wand and then somebody comes up with an idea it doesn't really have the impact people then go oh we tried move on and I think we have to make sure and I'm very pleased today I can be here discussing this with you that it is an ongoing process you know it will always be there but we mustn't sit back and pat ourselves on the back and say oh haven't we done really well we've got to say no we've got to keep pushing pushing and pushing and making sure we're reaching all those people who need the help as well. How have people responded to you in the position of Mayor were there any barriers that you had to break down? I suppose language barrier a northern boy being the Mayor of Cambridge I mean my accent I think my accent's gone really now but a lot of people said oh you've got a very strong northern accent but no I think most people because Cambridge is this cosmopolitan city and everybody is so diverse then it's I think yeah I didn't have any problems and one of the things I did especially different was I was known as a person without socks as well so any engagement I went to I always made sure I had two odd socks on as well and it was interesting how people hooked up on that as well so radio commentators would say show us your socks Mark make sure the right ones and the kids felt that was great as well and again for the youngsters high-fiving so the Mayor with all these robes on then he's big chains what have you and he's funny out what have you walking along the line going high-five high-five so yeah so yeah so I think Cambridge welcomes the Mayor as well and I know sometimes people think do we need a Mayor now but I think the Mayor has an important role to play in Cambridge because the reasons we've said the Mayor can get to organisations in a non-political role and then can engage with people as well and then people can see that you in a sense you're one of them you're not set apart from them so I think you know we need to make sure the morality continues and in a sense look to see how the morality can get it to those other parts of society that may be in the past it's been sticking on the big civic and ceremonial things whereas we know there's so many organisations who would love a visit and have a photograph taken as well and the encouragement and the lift you see when you go a number of people used to say to me how long can you stop with us and it was how long do you want me for today and it was like oh we thought you were just coming for five minutes to shake hands and then you'd have to dash off no you know I want to find out what you're doing I want to know how I can help in the future so no long may the morality in Cambridge continue and long may it reach out to those places that you know other places aren't reaching. So you're talking a lot about the different communities in Cambridge what are some misunderstandings that exist regarding these communities? I think the misunderstandings are that all the communities face the same issues in a sense they all face the same issues of isolation, loneliness, financial support and I think the more we engage with the different communities the more we can actually find solutions to them as well so instead of trying to keep placing them all as these separate little identities we can realize there are common things within all of them that should be easy to reach and instead of making it difficult with the forms we have to fill in make the forms easier to fill in make it so it's face-to-face when you see him not fill in a 50 page form you email off to somebody who's really got no idea maybe of what you're trying to achieve and people who aren't good at form filling in who then think no I don't want to fill that it's too complicated and yet there's money there maybe that's available and small grants I mean the City Council do have community grants that are available and in a sense we never have enough we know it can make a massive difference so for a small group 50, 100 pound could be massive but if you have to fill in a 50 page document to get it a lot of people go do you know what no I'm not going to do it. That's something that we've heard from a number of communities we film recently is actually the form filling so where English isn't their first language for example or even if it is their first language but they haven't had the they haven't been able to have the education to be able to read and write and it still happens today but form filling is huge isn't it absolutely huge and again you know we talk about hard to reach communities hardly reached we talk about things that are being done well things that aren't being done well maybe that's a focus that might be quite helpful for Cambridge City and surrounding communities I agree I agree with that yeah. I know as a City Council now we're trying to make try and make it easier we we're trying to say to people do contact us so maybe we can organise the visit so I would say to any organisation look don't be daunted by the form filling go for it ring the telephone number send the email ask can you have a visit ask can you go along to talk through the form as well get yourself on the ladder because once you're on it makes life that much easier. Does that have an impact do you think also on people's mental health and well-being? The form filling yeah very much so I think you know people who are who are struggling with stress having to fill in another big form in one of you can just be enough to go oh no sorry I don't want to do it so so I think the more we can make life simpler to to fill forms in the better it will be and we seem to have got into a place where we seem to be putting more questions on and I know I'm the chair of Charington Residents Association and when we apply for some funding and one of the questions was we're in the library are you using this to promote terrorist activity well tick yes or no why would you put down a form even because as though you would tick yes I'm doing this for terrorist activity and sometimes you think how would how are we working these questions out you know and for communities where actually that's a very loaded question for them if they're coming from an environment from an ethnic community it's about it's almost like you're targeting us to say you suspect us already yeah so sometimes we see it's a silly question for other people it might be no terrifying quite terrifying yeah so yeah so I have challenged our executive counsellors on who look after the grants to say can we look at the forms again can we keep looking at them to try and make them easier to overcome this problem we have where the communities small communities who need that money can actually access them as well so what needs of the communities in Cambridge are being met what needs are being met I think hopefully everybody's realizing that the communities want to be listened to they want to be engaged with and they want financial support and I think we're starting to see that a bit more now I think it's noticeable that with the media nowadays we see more on the radio about certain things programs about people's differences as well things like this podcast now where we're reaching out to as many different people as we can as we said earlier you know one person can make a huge difference with one small step so nobody should ever think I can't make a difference yes you can and it's not necessarily giving money because sometimes we all believe it's giving the money volunteering is massive for these small organizations as well so volunteering a couple of hours and the volunteering is massive it can be anything from just talking to somebody to driving a car to weeding I work at Darwin Nutries volunteer there there's lots of different aspects of volunteering so again you know you've got a skill that you can do as a volunteer you might be a good listener you might be a good talker you look at all the organizations who are crying out for people so yeah you know think about volunteering not necessarily the money it's not a case of putting your hand in your pocket it's time and of course time is the biggest essence to everybody so yeah so what needs of the communities in Cambridge aren't being met I think maybe I still think probably the profile a lot of them find that the profile is is not high enough to be reached so I think when you talk to especially the universities and the academics sometimes they're not aware of some of these organizations and what they're doing and how they can help as well so I think things like today where we can have a broadcast to talk about a few of those organizations like Red End, like Romsey Mill, like Cambridge Aid can make a massive difference as well so I think it's raising the awareness because it's like anything it's only when that awareness becomes more in the in the public gaze in a sense that things happen but these organizations will carry on regardless of whether in the public gaze or not because the people who work for them and I've seen it firsthand it's not a job to do it's their commitment it's their life it's their passion so whether somebody gives them 10 pounds or not is not going to make a difference and they are committed to what they're seeing as making life better for people in Cambridge and I think surely that must be what we all want to do we want to make life better for everybody in Cambridge because everybody deserves that chance everybody deserves a chance to have somewhere to live food on the table kids to have the clothing and it is basic things as well I think sometimes we hear people say oh they've got a 63 inch television they've got this down the other but then a lot of them haven't got that and they struggle with the shoes and they struggle with the uniform and they struggle with putting curtains on the window so you see the other side of society as well and again I did some big issue selling as well I was asked to do some selling for the big issue and that's an eye-opener as well you tend to think why can't they get a proper job why did like that it's their own fault until you realize you get in that position and you could all fall through that trap as well so people who work the jobs people who then become made redundant people who then make the payments cause family problems and then they have to leave the family and then they do sofa surfing and then that doesn't work and then they're on the street and then when they get on the street they're waiting under pain just to have a drink to have a smoke and it becomes a vicious circle then of trying to get back out of it as well so I would say to anybody when you see someone selling the big issue don't just go oh get a proper job you need to look at you know why they got in that position and that's how I did it for three hours and it's amazing people's reactions to the big issue sellers as well because I did it no chains on so it's just like the red jacket so nobody knew who I was till later on if they brought one you've just brought one with the mayor of Cambridge a lot of people won't walk past the door you're invisible a lot of people you see across the street as they were coming down and yet lots of other people who would stop and chat with you as well so that's the flip side isn't it that there are people who are genuinely you know lovely you often think oh no this is terrible people who think the worst but actually there are people who really do it's a civic society they go out and they help and they want to help I'm just wondering Mark with your time in Cambridge have you seen a generational impact on with poverty in Cambridge have you seen that it has an impact on generations is it something do you think that it's something that if there is support and as early intervention that could the generational decline could be nipped in the bud I would think that must be the case because if you look at the wards that are struggling those wards are the wards that have struggled for years and years and years and again it's sad really because when we talk about the wards we talk about Abbey Ward and King Edges so we know the wards that are most affected and we know people now are starting to reach out into those wards as well so Abbey people have got their own organization Abbey people with Richard Starr Marshalls are out as well so people recognizing it but yeah there's a generational one that if you don't make a start from those children leaving school and they have to stop in that area it becomes that circle of life in a sense it doesn't change so we like you say we have to be good at targeting and making sure what we're doing has has an impact so like I say it's not just giving the money because that's easy to do to throw the money at it it's actually making sure the money we're putting in or the time and the effort is directed into what will make those life changes because if we don't make those life changes it carries on it carries on so you've already mentioned redundancy and the impact of that and outside of this podcast we have discussed the interconnectedness of redundancy inequalities and budgeting could you tell us a little bit more about that yeah I mean from a personal point of view point I got made redundant twice in my career and I was always a person who was a bit hard I suppose you know if you get redundant you know man up get yourself a job what's your problem but then when it happened to me personally boy did it have an impact because the redundancy the positions I were in the firms are doing well the division I was responsible for was doing well they actually said to me we've got no problems with how you're managing but we're restructuring and due to the restructure your job is no longer available and it was just like as though somebody cut my feet away from underneath me it was really really hard a feeling of worthlessness a feeling of I've given so many years to that firm I put my heart and soul into doing this stuff and it really did I really did struggle with getting back to a certain point as well to say yeah come on keep going get you know get back in the saddle what have you so I can easily understand for some people who might be struggling already that all of a sudden you know you were making a redundant how on earth do they cope and then once you get into that cycle how do you get out of that cycle and again as a as a as a young young dad married at 21 our first son at 23 we we had a firm's house in a sense so we didn't have a lot of income and of course one of the things was you want my family we were away from our family as well so no family support as well so you want to make sure you can afford things so the credit card was like a access was the name of in those days it became mastercard but access was the one and what happened was it was a case of oh well we'll use the credit card because that means we can buy it when it's cheap and we can pay off the full amount when it comes in and how many of us kid ourselves that we'll pay the full amount off when the bill comes in so the bill comes in and it's like oh I'll pay half of it this time and I'll do the rest next time and then before you know it you reach the full limit on your credit card and all you're paying off is the interest on it and your debt is rising and rising so you realize you need to get the scissors out cut the card up and make sure nothing goes on the bill again and my wife had a little cash book as well where everything was wrought in what what we were spending as well even comics if the children had a comic what they spent for the comic housekeeping things so we could keep a track of it as well so I say a lot of us take it for granted that everybody knows how to budget and it's straightforward but for a lot of people it's not taken for granted the money comes in and you don't realize what your bills are going to become in the future so you don't think about that 12 months of how much your bills are going to be your television license your car insurance and mortgage payment for anything else you just look at what you've got here and now and that's that thing you're making people aware to say look you know look at that full picture of what you're doing and I say there's organizations there who want to help you get into it as well and there's no shame it's not a case of I'm not good at maths I can't do it it's got nothing to do with it it's just writing down your circumstances and it's amazing once you write it down and you can see what's there it makes life easier but yeah redundancy and the mental stress it can cause as well and again not having family support as well it's another thing we take for granted that everybody's near the family because we were 200 miles away from our family my four brothers were near mum and dad so for them babysitting was not a problem whatsoever mum dad can you come around and babysit for us 200 miles away can you find neighbours can you find that support chain if you've got no money you can't afford a babysitter so you can't go out so that can put more pressure on as well so there's all these things that can come into the melting pot that start building up as well so I say if you've been maybe redundant and you're away from your family as well all of a sudden you've got the money issues you've got the family you cannot go out things start boiling up as well and I say they all add up to this mental and the fast living society where we're pushed on all the time and how does this impact mental health and mental well-being well you see I think like say the big issue sellers you see at winter comfort when you go around and talk to people where I was fortunate I managed to escape in a sense and go forward but you see other people who haven't managed to do it and not because they haven't tried as well so I remember talking to one chap at winter comfort and he was he had a job I asked him up in Nottingham and he was he was doing very well did a big old Christmas a few years ago he'd taken on some more debt because things were okay and then what happened was after the Christmas the manager came up and said to him sorry making you redundant just like that out the blue no warnings whatever and all of a sudden he faced the fact that he'd taken more debt on one of you as well that then forced him into family issues with with his family that meant to him being moving from the family that meant to moving away from the area altogether and coming to Cambridge and then he told me how to numb the pain you start having a smoke and you end up with other people similar whose way of helping you is to say have a drink and before you know it you're on that spiral and the good news was now he's managed to get a flat he's going back learning again as well his children have got back in touch with him and he's getting on that curve but like I say it's amazing how you can just end up slipping down and again there's another lady telling us who runs a coffee shop in Cambridge who helps out with a big issue a lovely lady she looks out for people as well and she said she noticed this chap stood opposite one of the colleges every day with his takeaway coffee and he looked quite dressed up and so after the third day she went up and said to him are you all right and he said um no he said things are a bit hard and when she looked behind she noticed he got the sleeping bag behind him on the wall she said what's happened he said um well I was a senior driving instructor um and then things spiraled and um I've just had to leave my family she said well did he know where you are he went no I couldn't even talk to him I just had to go just with what I've got on and the thing as well so well shall I talk to um can I bring your family for you no he said I don't want anybody knowing where I am but over time she managed to get closer to him and then of course he's managed to get sorted out and he's back in touch with his family so like I say we we look at people and don't understand where they've got to where they are um and and that's the the hard thing sometimes we just look at people and and then see whatever we want to see sometimes you know we make our own impact to say oh yeah it's their own fault yeah they should know better so we're all that one step away everybody's that one step away from being into that decline and every day we should be thankful that yeah we're keeping on top of things as well and because we can do it it's trying to help those other people in whatever way we can yeah no absolutely and these cycles of adversity that people experience they not only have an impact on on relationships or mental health mobbing but physical health as well don't know it's another thing that people don't really talk about yeah the physical health impact yeah I mean physically a lot of things cause that when you have the stress it can lead to other things as well um and I think that's another side of the coin as well um the stress that can lead to physical things which means then you can't apply for certain jobs you get into this spiral where you can't do things um and then you start believing maybe that you you can't do it anyway then because you've been told by society you can't do it and you end up just then either following that that same pattern wherever you as well and I know things like um autism um I've got five grandsons and um three of them are autism spectrum and I had a telephone call today from our eldest grandson and he said granddaddy's grandma with you and I said no she's not he said well I need to share something with you and I said oh oh okay so um I got back to grandma and we rang him back and I said what is it he said oh I need to tell you I've been tested for autism and I'm on the autism spectrum so did he feel good that he had um so did he feel validated that he knew yeah very very much so he felt he wasn't um it wasn't him in a sense that people say well you know think a bit harder and then to know no it's not so now he can take the steps so like keep a journal write things down the diary check those things out as well so it was a big relief in a sense that yeah I know I'm not um it's not me yeah and I can manage now and go with it as well and my other grandson he's just started this week with the prince's trust and it's a big turnaround for him as well because he's he didn't school from when he was 11 he had like social anxiety and he couldn't face anything he locked himself away in his bedroom he didn't look after himself and he's managed to turn full circle now and he's really keen to um get back out and earn again as well so what do the Cambridge community still need I think Cambridge communities still need um an awareness of why who they are why they are what they need as well um so somewhere I think we need to have some kind of I don't know if I knew the answer because I'd have done it and I'd have fixed it but we need to have something where we're getting closer to the organizations where the organizations feel more of the mainstream as well where they don't feel they have a begging bowl to go out to people to for the funds they need where they can plan better going forward as well so it's not reactive all the time where it's a case of oh we need to raise 500 pound to do this and we've done that this year now we need a thousand pound next year to do that and we should be trusted these organizations they know what they want Romsey Mill know what they need to deliver these programs Red End Project knows what they need to reach out and what they do so we've either got to say we trust you guys we trust you that you are embedded in our communities that you are better place than anybody to say what is needed Abbey people who's in their ward who's very close to what's happening so we have to say yes we trust you that what you're saying is correct we trust you that what you need is going to be used correctly and then we have to put our hands in our pocket as as a council as a community as individuals to say we will now support you and then what happens is of course we will see because we can see them what what they are doing and they can come back to us like anything and say this year this is what we want to achieve and we can achieve that by doing that so we turn around and say we've given you that now have you achieved what you said you're going to do and if you didn't why why was that the case was it money was it volunteers was it what was it that that didn't make it happen but we've got to really get behind the organizations that are in the hot spots in the city that make us the most unequal city in the UK and we've got to get behind them and encourage them in a big way and not just sometimes talking gestures which are all very nice but but it doesn't help them keep going all the time as well you know these people do an amazing job um it just makes me well up when I think of all what they're doing you know you need to see how they reach out how they make an impact um so yeah people just you know even if you just send them an email send them a card just to say well done you you're making a great job because sometimes that encouragement is as much as giving them the money as well to tell people they're recognized in what they're doing and like I said early on they don't do it for the recognition but boy it makes a difference Rowan as well um another organization unbelievable working with you know adults uh youngsters with learning difficulties you know it's a huge area of what we're talking about uh it's not just people who've fallen through a financial crack it's people for whatever reason not their fault that they've got a disability that they will have for the rest of their life and then do we turn around and do what we used to do lock them away into you know hospitals out of the way of public gaze and then we find out 40 years later that person was locked away for something ridiculous or do we try and find a way of saying how do we help these people reach the best potential they can do because these these people are amazing when you go and work with them and see the other skills they have it's fantastic so yeah you know we've got to really get alongside the people who were close to us in Cambridge you know they're not a million miles away that you know they're on our doorsteps they're on our doorsteps and that's the sad thing as well and Cambridge has got so much money um I know as a city council we're going through a time now of saying we've got to be careful because we're not getting money from central government we're still trying to give our community grants out we're still trying to reach out as a councillor I'm trying to do the bits in my ward as well um to help promote people coming together we've got a community upstart in in uh Cambridge in Cherryinton the library is being converted it's taken nine years it was something out of vision to do they said let's have a community up in Cherryinton where people can come and meet and a cafe that's served by local people at local prices um so hopefully next May that will open and hopefully we can get people coming and meeting together um like I said simple things having a cup of coffee with somebody having a piece of cake with them listening to where they are makes a massive difference and I'll finish by asking what is the impact of having a support group or a community around you oh I suppose I wouldn't be here today without having that support and I think for most of us if we're honest we've been supported in one way or another throughout our life either support from our our parents at a young age um the bank of mum and dad for some people as well um grandmas and granddads who were there to to help out um we are back with our daughter for childminding because childminding is so expensive nowadays as well so if they had to pay childminding that would be horrendous our daughter like I say lives in Rutland our husband's in the RAF he's from Cornwall so they have no in a sense local family nearby so we're the nearest local family 16 miles away but again we've made the effort to say that's not going to stop us going there what have you so support is key and support for me I'm a man of faith I came late to faith but I'm a man of faith and that has made a big difference as well but there are so many different organizations and communities who want to help um people and not be judgmental so it's not a case of um we're going to um in a sense tell you why you failed but we're going to point out your failures we're going to point out why you've never made it you know we've got organizations who are saying you're valued you are of worth we want you to do more you know we want to get alongside you we're not here to discuss your past failings we're here to go forward what have you uh and and that's massive to people as well people feeling they're being listened to people feeling there's somebody to give them time as well and and again we said earlier time is an amazing thing and I always I always look at people and it's a bit of a cliche when when I talk to people and and and I say to them have you got time to listen and they go yeah and then you see him look at the watch um and I've seen it so many times in the past as well and and it's awful that when somebody said to you you haven't got time to listen to it and then all of a sudden they start looking at the watch if you haven't got time say there and then I haven't got time at the moment but can we arrange and the time to listen um but but yeah support family groups community groups it's society and we're made to be society and one of the dreadful things is we had a prime minister once who said there's no such thing as society and that has caused massive problems ever since because in a sense you've been told you've got to fend for yourself I'm all right Jack the ends justify the means if you haven't done it's your own fault you know society is there for everybody um and it needs to be put back on the top of the agenda you know that society in all its forms um is there to make us better individually as groups and as society that we all benefit from it we can't live ourselves in in a shell and I suppose that's great about these podcasts now that hopefully we're getting out of the shells we're reaching areas that you know other people can't reach um and like I say so if today one person hears this and says you know what that's made my thinking different about how I look at people that's made me think about how I can reach out then this is going to have been all all worth the while um so again that one person making that one step will have a massive impact and that one step then will make another step as they get onto somebody else as well so thank you for giving me the time to um explain my past year some of my life as well and I'm more than happy in the future if people want to have a chat with me I'm always here to have a chat thanks Alice yeah well thank you so much for joining us it's been fascinating I mean I couldn't agree more with what you have to say about society and the importance of community and it's been absolutely fascinating to hear all about your journey and about you know all about these communities that you've interacted with in Cambridge so thank you so much for joining us this has been in conversation from the Rudd Centre University of Cambridge thanks for listening