A Space for Space CTRLShift at Spode

Factory: a building or group of buildings where goods are manufactured or assembled chiefly by machine - from the latin factor
Factor: a circumstance, fact, or influence that contributes to a result

Spode Outbuilding VMcGarvey cc

CTRLShift, is a gathering of people that wants to

"Create spaces and processes that enable collaboration, alignment and action between changemakers, locally, regionally and nationally."

Its admirable and ambitious aims are to

Build agency and power in local communities
Shift power from Westminster and corporations
Tackle the growing social, democratic, environmental and economic challenges, in order to create a just, inclusive, equitable, ecologically wise, socially regenerative, economically re-localised, adaptive and resilient society, together

Formed in 2017, last year's summit was in Wigan. The planning and location seeking purposefully focus's on so-called "Brexit Towns", the reason being according to CTRLShift, is

"that many of these represent places left behind, places where change is needed here and now"

To a certain extent, I would agree with this statement and a "factory" in Stoke is probably an ideal place to develop challenging new ideas, that could be put into production. However, I would probably argue that support for Brexit goes beyond Brexit towns, and the issue is a far more complex cultural challenge for society. It is a structural hegemonic entity that extends beyond the psyche of post-industrial towns, which may be impenetrable for grassroots changemakers.

I was attending the summit as a fact-finding mission to see what community activities were taking place to encourage local agency during a very challenging time for the City. I was particularly interested in women as changemakers, working-class agency, and heritage and creative projects

Reflective Moment Spode Warehouse
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I found the first day quite a challenge, to be honest. It felt a little bit chaotic, and paradoxically although Spode provided us with lots of space, even if it was a little on the chilly side, I felt I was not getting enough personal space to explore further some of the themes and to share practice. I could see art and creativity had been embedded into some excellent projects but they did not seem to be driving projects. This appeared to be reflected in the mapping exercise, where the themes of creativity and art, and heritage and culture were the least represented by projects. All this, however, is my personal perception over a short period, and I am slightly biased towards clear outputs at events rather than things developing organically, I know that is a matter of taste.

Project Mapping 1 Project Creativity & Art Engagement: Kick Start Art
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Mapping Project 2 Projects Heritage & Culture: Bound by Clay & Happy Museum
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After recovering from an exhausting first day, and thinking I should have gone to the Culture and Creativity Solution session, details of which can be found in this Alternative UK article about the Happy Museum and the Airspace Gallery in Stoke-on-Trent, I was really unsure what to expect on the second, luckily I made better choices for my solution sessions. The first was People Powered Money led by Mike Riddell, from Counter Coin , which wants to mint money, using locally produced clay, that it will use to value the contribution people make to their community. It will then lobby local business community to accept these tokens in full or part payment for food or spare capacity that would otherwise be wasted - at no cost to the business.

Counter Coins Plastic & Clay
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This was followed by Community Led Housing, Steve Hoey, from the National Community Land Trust Network, which supports the creation of affordable, environmentally sustainable housing, to help tackle climate change and poverty This tapped into my interest in urban design, and how good design, in particular, housing, can have a dramatic impact on people's lives for the better. Something we need to explore further and encourage in Stoke-on-Trent.

CTRLShift had already acknowledged on its website that Stoke-on-Trent has an

"emergent alliance of interdependent and interconnected organisations from the local government, civil society, business and academic sector",

Many have said that Stoke-on-Trent's bid for the 2021 city of culture was the unexpected catalyst for this. In the afternoon I had an appreciative opportunity, in a breakout group, to get to know more about some of the local influential projects represented at the Summit, some of which had been involved in the bid. Wanting to exploit the generated momentum of the bid, we discussed how we would integrate some the CTRLShift principles (see aims above) into current and future activities. The consensual aspiration of the group was to crush the Stoke-on-Trent Brexit City derogatory label with a new positive branding. Our enthusiastic group agreed to stay connected and start mapping projects and activities that were taking place to these principles.

Afterward, I reviewed CTRLShift's summit outcomes for Stoke-on-Trent. It said that groups working at a local level should:

Have shared their own work, challenges and successes with each other and the wider CTRLshift network;
Have better access to champions, organisations and networks that can support them in their work; and
Have identified opportunities, new ways of working and new approaches to social, environmental and economic transformation that can be used to strengthen existing work.

Out of the 3 outcomes, the first one was possibly the only one that that was the nearest to being achieved but there appeared to be general agreement to further concentrate and work towards the other 2, beyond the Summit. There were a number of local progressive grassroots groups, particularly those involved in creative enterprises that were not represented at the Summit, this is possibly why the last 2 outcomes could not be fully achieved. I am sure the best endeavors were made to make sure a higher number of local projects attended, but speaking to people after the event, the feedback from those that were invited but chose not to go, was that the marketing was a little confusing, and that they found it difficult to find the focus of the event or it did not appear to be relevant to them. Others were simply not aware of the Summit taking place. In Stoke-on-Trent, many changemakers are individual activists or represent small but very important groups, and sometimes they get missed when events are being organised and publicised.

So for me, a mixed experience. The Summit may not have answered my questions, I am still not sure how the larger population of Stoke-on-Trent would engage with some of the narrative presented here, especially those suffering the worst afflictions of austerity. Organisations need to make it easier for the general public to engage with some of the initiatives presented here at this summit. I am glad it chose Stoke-on-Trent as its location, and I had the opportunity to attend, and develop a knowledge of the committed work of community activitists, locally and nationally. Stoke-on-Trent, despite its size, is lucky to have communal spaces like Spode, so that community organisations can create space to further explore the very large transformational themes presented at this Summit and future embedding. It was great that many I spoke to at the Summit said they were surprised by what the City had to offer and would like to visit again to see more, and that instilled a sense of civic pride. This may not have been listed as an intended outcome but is a positive result and "factor "of the Summit taking place in Stoke-on-Trent at Spode.