Meetings, meetings, meetings!

Contract to Community (C2C) has been buzzing through my head and I thought the best way to develop it was to create a presentation, which I could refine as time goes on. I am indebted to some very kind and long-suffering friends and business contacts who indulged my excited ramblings and helped me refine my thinking - especially Angus Forbes, Paul Philpott, and Pete Goss.

To get it off the ground I need a pilot project and set out to have meetings with the City Council and some major procurers.

The first meeting I had was with the leader of Plymouth City Council, Tudor Evans OBE. Tudor immediately got the concept and LOVED it!  He immediately saw how we could make a real difference to our communities, keeping money in the City, and also the scalability of the idea that we could trial in Plymouth and take National! He is progressing this with his cabinet.

My next meeting was with Howard Goffin at The University of Plymouth. He didn’t know why I was there but over a coffee before we got into it he told me how the major buyers in the city were struggling with Social Value!  Hold that thought I said… Twenty minutes later and Howard was excited about the possibilities and will take it to the next buyers group.

Of course, the real coup would be to get the City’s biggest procurer on board and so I was so grateful that Simon Reid, MD at Babcock agreed to meet. He was incredibly supportive and, long story short, has tasked a team to look at Contract to Community and how it could work for them. So exciting!

Finally, I met with Paul White from All About The Place, who work with communities to support development and placemaking. I can’t tell you the adjective he used, but kindly called the idea ‘inspired’ and I am thrilled to be supported by him as we progress C2C.

So, we have started from the bottom up. My next task is to try from the top down and I have reached out to a Government minister to meet me and a date is in the diary… Watch this space!