Talking Food - The Campaign Weekend

Participants from the Food Insiders' Inquiry, the Lancashire Inquiry, the Cumbria Inquiry, the Merseyside and Cheshire Inquiry, the Greater Manchester Inquiry and the Young People's Inquiry took part in the Talking Food: Taking Action Campaign Weekend. The weekend was the culmination of ten months of deliberative food inquiries that have taken place across the North West, and it took place on 12 and 13 March 2011 at Trafford Hall in Chester.

The weekend provided lots of opportunities for people to talk to others and to find out what issues all the inquiries have in common, and for the participants to agree and set some priorities for a 'local vision for food' and to start to design some campaign actions.

Read our live blog from the weekend below. It's not quite the same as being there, but it's the next best thing!

Friday 11 March 2011, 7pm
The clock has just struck 7pm and the final car load is just leaving Our Life's offices. We're on our way to Trafford Hall for what should be a great weekend of discussion, debate and decisions.

Saturday 12 March 2011, 8am
It's dry and reasonably bright here at Trafford Hall as the first day dawns of our Campaign Weekend. We received a great boost last night when we received a message of support from Sheila Dillon from BBC Radio Four's The Food Programme. Check it out below.

_{"There's not much glamour or worldly credit in working to revolutionise the food system, but what you're doing is central to changing lives and life for the better. The way we grow, shop, cook and eat shapes the world. You're shaping the world. More strength to your elbows."
Sheila Dillon, The Food Programme, BBC Radio 4}

That should give all our participants a real boost, as should the following message from Kate Bull from The People's Supermarket

_{"I just wanted to give a huge, big cheer to all you guys for getting together to have a look at how you can make a difference in healthy eating; how coming together can actually start to create this change that we need to make to support everybody to have a better quality of life. I think it's fantastic work and if you need any help from The People's Supermarket, you know where to find us."
Kate Bull, Co-founder, The People's Supermarket}

We've received even more messages of support for the weekend. You can read them here.

Last night the facilitators and speakers met to make the final arrangements for the weekend, so we're now all systems go. We've got a range of talented people helping us out over the next two days and we're grateful for their support. We're expecting our participants to arrive from about 9am, but the Cumbria delegation arrived last night as they had a longer journey than most. The venue looks good, with lots of rooms to work in, a reasonable wireless network and a great IT suite.

Anyway, it's time for breakfast now, so blogging will resume after that. Back shortly.

Saturday, 9.20am
Had a wonderful breakfast, returned to the reception and it's all happening. Our participants have begun to arrive! The Lancashire Inquiry members from Blackburn are here and are checking in to their rooms and the Young People's Inquiry members from Oldham are here too. They seemed quite excited as they got off their mini-bus - we think they'll be quite vocal during the weekend, which is a good thing. There's a picture of them arriving below.

Saturday 10am
It's a right hive of activity here now. Participants arriving all the time.

People who have never met before are talking with each other and sharing their experiences of the Talking Food inquiries. Who needs an 'icebreaker' session later when everyone is getting along famously? It's brilliant. What a start to the weekend - and we haven't even started yet, if you know what we mean!

Saturday 10.25am
Just five minutes to the off and it really is all go here.

People are checking inn from all over the place. We have participants from Cumbria, Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Cheshire, Merseyside, Food Insiders and the Young People's Inquiry in Oldham. Trafford Hall is a buzz with discussion, chat and a lot of energy. Everybody's Talking Food!

Just said hello to Kath and Natasha from Partington earlier. Here they are pictured below at the reception desk.

Before Our Life's Peter Bryant makes the introductions, participants are listening to our food-related CD soundtrack. It's a bit cheesy (geddit?) but what can you do?

Saturday 11.30am
The opening session has just finished. Peter Bryant, Our Life's public engagement manager, kicked things off by saying that when governments want to solve big problems they usually go to highly paid 'experts' to get their view. "In seeking to make a better food system, we have decided to go to the people, the real experts, who experience the food system every day, to get their views about what needs to change.

The room is packed and everyone is listening attentively as Peter runs through all the introductions. Dan from the Young People's Inquiry tells everyone about how keen the young people are to get stuck in to the debates over the weekend. Our signer, Raz has been introduced. He's been working with the deaf young people who are here. He's got a busy couple of days ahead.

Although the weekend is fairly informal, the group are running through a few basic ground rules for the day. No jargon or big words otherwise you get red carded! One voice at a time to make it easy for people to understand what's going on. It's compulsory to meet and talk to new people, which is unavoidable here really! And, total respect for all. Really good to see all this suggested and agreed by everyone in the room. 

Already there's been some great interaction between the young people and the 'less young' people in the room! Some cracking discussions taking place just before a session on what was good about the food inquiries people have taken part in.

Just before the session starts, we read out Sheila Dillon's (BBC Food Programme) message of support to the campaign weekend. It was very well received and got a good round of applause. And Peter Bryant from Our Life is showing off his mini wall chart that shows what the two days are all about.

Members of the different inquires meet for ten minutes and then report back to the main group on what their eight-week sessions came up with to make the food system better for them. Some of those reporting back have never spoken in front of a big audience before and it's really inspiring to hear what they have to say and the passion with which they say it. There are clearly some characters in the room too - and that makes for a lot of fun, which everyone appreciates.

Jill Hulme from the Food Insiders' Inquiry reports back first and highlights supermarket power as a big issue for the members of her inquiry. Too powerful by half it seems and they want to see something done about it. A lot of heads nodding in the room when she's speaking so she's obviously struck a chord.

Rob from the Lancashire Inquiry tells the group that the participants in Blackburn were very concerned about the high number of take aways in the local area. Something needs to be done about that and it's clear that others in the room share his concern about unhealthy food outlets springing up all over the place. The Blackburn people were also concerned about food labelling - it's too confusing - and that's why they had the Food Standards Agency speaking at their inquiry.

Saturday, 1.20pm
Catching up on what's been happening in the morning session since Rob from Blackburn spoke about the Lancashire Inquiry. He was followed by Mike Minogue from Cleator Moor and the Cumbria Inquiry, who spoke about the geographical isolation of the county and the difficulties that brings with regard to ready access to healthy, local food. He also highlighted take aways as being a problem (bit of a trend developing here) and announced that inquiry members were looking at setting up a food co-op. With Ruth Kelly from Sustain speaking at a workshop this evening on food co-ops, we probably know where Mike is going to be!

Kenny Spain and Val Phillips (pictured below) from Ellesmere Port spoke next. Kenny is clearly a man very proud of his area, as he gave a comprehensive run down of the history and at times the topography of Ellesmere Port! He's also passionate about the local food system and making it better.

Val managed to get a word in too and spoke about the key issues unearthed by the Merseyside and Cheshire Inquiry, which included food education, supermarket power and the need for food courses - which they have already been organising. They are also looking at setting up a food co-op too - that seminar this evening is looking more popular by the minute!

After Kenny and Val we had Natasha and Ashra from Partington and the Greater Manchester Inquiry. They highlighted the limited shopping facilities in their area as being important to them and the need to have better choice with regard to their local supermarket. They'd like to see more support from the local authority, Trafford Council, and they'd like help in making better use of their local allotments so they could have better access to grow-your-own produce.

Natasha and Ashra were followed by the Young People's Inquiry members, who took over the room with their massive banner which told the story of all the issues they discussed at their inquiry sessions. Take aways (again!) and labelling were massive issues for the youth - one street in Oldham was said to be inundated by fast food joints. The young people had cooking sessions at their inquiry sessions where they bought the ingredients for meals for less than a fiver. With the support of speakers from organisations like Can Cook and the Children's Food Campaign they had a great time over the several weeks of their inquiry. Their banner though has to be seen to be believed - so here it is pictured below.

Saturday, 2pm
Participants are getting stuck into a big Open Space session now where they discuss the inquiries they've all been involved in and what specific campaigns they want to see developed as a result.

This is the chance for people to really have their say about things that concern them so that they have no regrets when they leave the weekend that they didn't mention something that they were really passionate about.

There is a lot of energy in the room and people are really having their say - so this part of the weekend is definitely working as planned. It will be interesting to see what gets agreed as campaign priorities in the next couple of hours.

Saturday, 3.50pm
The Open Space session is going really well. Participants are discussing, debating and prioritising the key food issues that they want to take forward for campaigning - and what they want to campaign on.

Once again, I'm struck by the amount of passion in the room and knowledge of the issues. You almost want to bottle that passion and the enthusiasm and serve it up in a glass with a couple of ice cubes to every politician and decision maker in the North West! Surely then we'd get change.

The image on the wall (left) shows the wide range of interconnected issues and challenges that the different inquiries discussed and some of the possible solutions to address them. Powerful stuff. Politicians, take note.

While the Open Space session is going on we took the opportunity of chatting with Johny Chatterton of 38 Degrees and Our Life's Andrew Taylor about campaigning online and what works best.

38 Degrees were behind the recent successful campaign to stop the sell off of the forests, which led directly to the government backing down on its privatisation plans.

Our Life is very fortunate to have someone like Johnny (pictured below) here for the two days.

He's running a seminar on online campaigning this evening, which should be very interesting. He certainly knows his stuff and is very enthusiastic too.

Saturday, 4pm
Wow! Just had a great discussion with Cameron and Sam from the Young People's Talking Food Inquiry in Oldham, who told us about what they've been getting up to in their sessions and what they think of the weekend.

They were really pleased to be working together with older people who were "just like them" with similar views on food and who didn't talk down to them.

One of the things that's really struck us about this weekend so far is the way that young and not so young are mixing and getting on together. The beauty of the deliberative process is that it has that effect on people. It brings people together and breaks down barriers. Organisations and institutions should definitely use it more as a way of finding out what people think about the issues that matter.

Back to that discussion with Cameron and Sam, they also kindly agreed to do an interview with me, which is available below. Well worth a watch for really good stuff about the Young People's Inquiry and their thoughts on the campaign weekend.

Saturday, 5.45pm
The afternoon session has just ended and what a session it was. Participants discussed all the issues that were important to them and then spent time looking at potential campaign actions that might help achieve their aims.

After that, the issues and campaigns were stuck up on the wall and people discussed them further and tried to prioritise them. At one point there were about 16 or 17 issues up on the wall and people were very passionate about 'their' issue and argued for it being prioritised. Really powerful stuff seeing that happen, but all done very respectfully.

The prioritisation process worked by people gathering in front of the issue they thought was important and then everyone 'voting' on issues with a system of sticky dots.

From this process we'll see all the issues and campaigns rationalised into a priority order which will be discussed at tomorrow's sessions.

That process will be undertaken by the facilitators this evening, while everyone else attends a series of seminars on a range of campaign-related issues and topics - it is after all a campaign weekend!

Saturday, 7.15pm
A hiatus now before the seminars start at half past seven. A chance to reflect on what's been achieved so far. It's difficult to know where to start really because so much has gone on. First things first, people are buzzing with ideas here. They've come together today for the first time as a group, rolled up their sleeves and distilled all their experience of their respective Talking Food inquiries to prioritise a series of issues that they want to see addressed to make it easier to get hold of healthy, local food.

That's some achievement in less than seven hours on one day. Of course, it hasn't just been one day because in the run up to today's campaign weekend we've had six inquiries made up of seven, eight or nine sessions, involving between 25-30 people at each session. To recap, we've had a Food Insiders' Inquiry, a Lancashire Inquiry, a Cumbria Inquiry, a Merseyside and Cheshire Inquiry, a Greater Manchester Inquiry and a Young People's Inquiry. That's a lot of collective discussion, debate and decision to be distilled into this weekend and from where I'm sitting, it seems to be working as a process. Yes it's messy at times, a bit frustrating and a bit scary, but deliberation works - you get decisions that people support and decisions that people want to get involved in implementing.

The implementation bit as far as this campaign weekend is concerned is citizens from all of the above inquiries working together to get the change they want to see to improve their food system and to make things better for themselves, their family, their friends, their communities - for all of us.

Saturday, 7.40pm
A series of campaign workshops is about to start. Issues being covered include "Campaigning using the Internet" with Johnny Chatterton from 38 Degrees; "How to set up a Food Co-op" with Ruth Kelly from Sustain; "How to Influence Politicians" with Calum Irving and Andrew Taylor of Our Life and "How to use the Media and using Local Radio" with Andy Walker from Our Life. Despite the fact that it's getting on for 8pm and the last workshop doesn't finish until 9.45pm, there's been a very good take up for the workshops. People are clearly keen to take the opportunity to learn about how to campaign more effectively.

When the workshops finish, there'll be some much needed 'down time', where participants can relax, watch a film at the Talking Food: Taking Action Cinema (Food inc. I'm told) and even chill (it is March after all) around a camp fire in the grounds of Trafford Hall.

Some of the participants are looking forward to the campfire and have even promised a song or two. We guess that's what they call singing for your supper! With that pretty lame joke, we're off round the workshops to see what's being said.

Saturday, 10pm
The workshops have just finished and participants have stayed the course. A 12-hour day for most of the people here is drawing to a close. A lot of good ideas in the workshops from what we could see and much enthusiasm for using various campaigning techniques. I can hear the hubbub from the bar outside, so the discussions are still going on. Tomorrow will see some real campaigning start and plans being made for future activity. That promises to be very exciting. We'll be back blogging here in the morning from around 9am.

For now, it's goodnight from Trafford Hall.

Sunday 13 March 2011, 8am
Live blog continues below.

Good morning from a wet Trafford Hall. No dampening the enthusiasm of the Talking Food Campaign Weekenders though as many have already got up and are making their way to breakfast.

Another big day today. The campaign aims decided yesterday will be discussed through and participants will start to design specific campaign actions and work out what they need to carry them out. A series of 'Taking Action' workshops this afternoon will see participants taking real campaign actions and also developing their skills so they are able to take actions at a later date.

For now it's breakfast. Back shortly.

Sunday, 9.30am
The morning session is just about to start.

Before it does, there's just time to report that we've done an interview for BBC Radio Lancashire which will hopefully go out on the news bulletins today.

Mohammed Razzaq from Blackburn (pictured left) spoke to the reporter and told him what the Lancashire Inquiry had been doing and why they were here this weekend.

Raz should be pleased with himself - he did the interview with Radio Lancashire when some of his fellow participants were still in bed!

Everyone's up now though and gathering in the main hall for the start of today's sessions, which will shape the campaigns that participants will take forward in the weeks and months ahead.

Sunday, 10am
We had a great start to the morning session, with a song by Ebony (pictured below), one of the participants from the Young People's Inquiry.

She sung one of her own compositions called Addicted - a beautiful, soulful sound that set the day off brilliantly.

There's certainly some talent and creativity in the room - as will be proved over the next few hours as participants develop the key campaigns that they want to take forward.

Participants have just agreed those campaigns and they are as follows: -

Education (1) - Access to healthy food education for adults and communities.

Education (2) - Better healthy food lessons in all schools.

Takeaways - Reduce the contribution of takeaways to unhealthy eating in the North West.

Advertising - Reduce the influence of junk food advertising aimed at kids, teens and adults.

  

In addition, three other issues were highlighted which Our Life will offer some assistance on but those will not be worked up into campaigns today. Those campaigns are Setting up a food Charity Shop; Need for Food Co-ops; More Allotments and Opportunities to grow your own Food.

Participants are now breaking out into the four groups highlighted above to discuss their campaigns and how to make them a reality.

Sunday 11.45am
Recap time. Apart from a brief coffee break at half eleven, the participants have been beavering away in four separate rooms across Trafford Hall working on the four campaigns they will be taking forward. With facilitators and resource people to assist, they have been drawing up some campaign actions which they will then bring back to the main group. The group will then offer their views on the actions proposed. The voting system plan at this stage is to hold up red, yellow and green sheets of paper indicating the following: -

Red - "I'm not so keen"

Yellow - "It's alright"

Green - "I love it and I want to do it!"

What happens then? We'll get an indication of what people want to campaign on and how the afternoon campaign sessions will shape up. That's the plan but it may change, as is the nature of the deliberative, fast-moving event that's been organised here. What is certain though is that we will get to a point where participants will be taking definite campaign actions this afternoon. That's exciting for everyone here. People have certainly come a long way since they arrived yesterday morning.

Sunday, 2.30pm
Lunch has been and gone and our participants are now back in their campaaign break-out sessions. Waiting for the sessions to break up and people to come back and report to the main group with what campaign actions they have decided to undertake is quite nerve racking. It will be exciting to see how creative people have been when they come back to the main group.

Just received a nice surprise via text. It's a message of support for the weekend from broadcaster Andy Crane.

He's reported on Our Life's work in the past on both TV and radio so he knows what we do. Here's his message here.

_{"I'm very familiar with the work Our Life are doing to change the way the world views food - thanks for the efforts you are making to help. Hopefully I'll be reporting the fruits of labour on the radio very soon!"
Andy Crane, Broadcaster}

Sunday 3.10pm
A quick tea break taking place now, then we're moving into the final session when we get to see the campaign actions that people have decided to run with. Then participants will step up and write their names next to those campaign actions that they want to get involved in. The three couloured sheets voting system won't be used after all. No matter as we'll get a more accurate indication of who wants to do what this way.

Before that session starts, we'll be playing Mohammed Razzaq's interview on BBC Radio Lancashire news from earlier today. You can hear it at this link and it's exactly one hour into the recording.

Sunday, 4.15pm
Wow! What a finale to the weekend. Participants have just reported back from their campaign sessions to tell everyone what they'll be campaigning on and how they will be doing it. Then people litterally stepped up to the plate and signed up to get involved in the various campaigns. The campaign has started, the ideas are flowing and the energy and enthusiam in the room is inspiring.

 

Here's what's planned for each campaign and briefly how it's going to happen.

Education (1) - Access to healthy food education for adults and communities.

Participants want to get to the people that matter and that particularly includes Education Minister Michael Gove and the Health Secretary Andrew Lansley. They're planning letters, an email campaign, social media and Facebook to build widespread support for improving access to healthy food education. Meetings with local MPs are probably on the agenda too and a lot more besides. Watch this space!  Pictured below is a draft letter, drawn up by participants, to be sent to MPs calling on them to act.

Education (2) - Better healthy food lessons in all schools.

The target for this campaign is to influence school governers who have the power to shape the curriculum in their individual schools. A letter will be drafted to go to all the chairs of school governors, with follow up meetings arranged in key areas.

Takeaways - Reduce the contribution of takeaways to unhealthy eating in the North West.

The target here is to reduce the number of unhealthy takeaways so that means targeting local council planning departments, via councillors, because they have the power to make decisions to change things. MPs will also be targeted to address this isssue by reducing takeaways via the Localism Bill. The Young People's Inquiry participants were especiaally interested in this campaign and they'll be pitching in with some social media action and petition organising. They'll be putting their own unique slant on the caampaign to show that young people are fed up with unhealthy takeaways on our streets. As they said when they reported back: "Don't take away our life!"

Advertising - Reduce the influence of junk food advertising aimed at kids, teens and adults.

The campaign for this is already well on the way. Local and national MPs will be targeted with an early day motion that the participants have already written in their break out group! They wrote it out longhand on a flip chart and stuck it up for all to see. Brilliant! Here it is pictured below.

Watching people walk up to the campaigns displayed on sheets on the wall and then write their names up to take part was great to see. Months of discussion and deliberation in the Talking Food inquiries that have taken place across the region is paying off. Pictured below is Kath Yearsley from Partington signing up to one of the campaigns.

Some final brief thoughts before we leave Trafford Hall. Firstly, how fantastic it was to see people come together to change things that are affecting their lives. From accross the North West - Cumbria, Lancashire, Greater Manchester, Cheshire, Merseyside, young and old, from inside the food system and beyond, all united with a common aim of making things better and organising together to make change happen. Inspiring to see. It was also inspiring to see plans being made with a determination and an enthusiasm to carry them out.

Someone once said that change can happen when people realise that it is in their own hands to make it so. The Talking Food participants realised that this weekend - and now they are ready to take action!

Goodbye from Trafford Hall and this campaign weekend.