Twelve years ago, Community Housing Cymru set up an Award scheme to recognise housing innovation in memory of a special person - Pat Chown. Pat gave a big part of her life to helping others and spent much of her working life in helping to meet people's housing needs in Wales.
Gwynedd-based horticulture, catering and joinery social enterprise tells us what makes the business a success, and about its plans to grow the organisation further.
Enterprise Minister to review social enterprise support
Date: 25.11.2011
Business & Enterprise Minister, Edwina Hart AM, told delegates at the Social Enterprise Wales 2011 event in Swansea last week that delivering the right kind of support for social enterprises would be a major focus as her department develops a new Micro-Business Strategy for Wales.
Receiving a warm welcome at the event, which attracted more than 200 people, the minister (pictured below) addressed delegates in her opening speech saying that she was looking at support for social enterprises.
She said: “We are doing all we can to provide the right business support to help you grow. But are we giving you what you want?”
Last month Mrs Hart announced the setting up of a Task and Finish Group, chaired by Robert Lloyd-Griffiths, the Director of the Institute of Directors in Wales, to provide advice and recommendations on the development and implementation of a Micro-Business Strategy.
At the event last week, she said that the review was necessary because she wasn’t sure they had ‘got it right’ when working with social enterprises and small businesses in the past. She felt that social enterprises wanted more business support from people who’d been through the process setting up and running a social enterprise themselves.
She also said that she realised procurement was ‘an enormous challenge to social businesses and all SMEs and that she was looking into the issue, taking the construction industry first.
The minister also took the opportunity to tell the audience at the event in Swansea that she would be setting up a Task and Finish Group on Cooperatives and Mutuals.
“Next year is the international year of the cooperative and it’s important that people control their own destiny more. We need to rebalance how world works. Wales has an abundant history of working collectively and sustainably,” she told delegates.
The two day conference, organised by Wales Cooperative Centre, WSEC and supported by the Welsh Government, proved to be a highly thought-provoking event. New partnerships were formed and the buzz of new ideas filled the venue. Around 500 watched the event online on day one, and 400 tuned in on day two.
Speaking after the event, John Bennett, CEO of WSEC said: “I’m really pleased with how our first social enterprise conference in Wales went. It exceeded all my hopes and expectations. I thought all the speakers were excellent.
Shining speakers
“Liam Black reminded us of some home truths, Brian Popsys gave us a great insight into how his social enterprise has developed and Lis Burnett’s message about the next generation of socially enterprising people was spot on. We were all blown away by Duncan Goose’s inspiring journey and David Le Page delivered a succinct and important international perspective.”
Bennett said the breakout sessions at the event, which covered some very current issues and topics, including community shares, partnership working, procurement and community shares,
were a “huge success”.
“Delegates told me that they really got something out of them,” he said. “I’m also really pleased that lots of people took advantage of the networking opportunities available. It’s important now to keep the momentum up and I’m excited about what we can do in the next conference,” concluded Bennett.
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