I am involved with Longridge Road Tenants and Residents Association (LRTRA), and I am also Chair of Preston Community Network. This means that I meet a lot of people! Last year a lady called Kailash from Preston College (although she no longer works for them) visited Millennium House to talk about the kinds of courses that we might be able to run. We got on with each other straight away, and started to become friends. Some time later Kailash (who is Hindu) had to organise a Hindu Youth Festival, and knowing of the work that I had done she rang me to ask for advice. I was able to help her out, and that strengthened the bond between us. After that, when our committee decided that the annual Longridge Road Estate Festival would be on ‘A Taste of India’, Kailash was happy to bring together some saris and Indian clothes for the children to dress up in. She also came to the carnival and toured the estate with us in the pouring rain, and her daughters and nieces performed a wonderful classical Indian dance for us.

Another example of breaking down barriers between cultures that I have started up is a multi-cultural cookery book. The idea for this began with a Caribbean cook-and-eat course that was run at Millennium House (Longridge Road Estate’s community house) a couple of years ago by Jean Lindsay and Dave Knight. We didn’t only learn how to cook delicious Caribbean dishes, but we also learned about Caribbean culture as well. This led me onto the idea of organising a multicultural cook-and-eat course, and this inspired the cookbook. I approached everyone I met who had moved to Preston from another culture to contribute a recipe to the book. Some of the tutors that came to Millennium House were from India and the Philippines. I knew a Maltese lady on our estate, and some Scots and Irish people living in other parts of Preston. I went to the Chinese takeaway on Brookfield to ask if they could contribute. People didn’t only have to write down their recipes, but also something about the place they came from, what it was famous for, and some information about the dish. What was interesting was that a lot of the dishes that people offered for the book were for nourishing and filling food that came about through making do in hard times. I am hoping in the future to get funding to have the book published, and with the support of Chef at Preston College’s St. Vincent’s Restaurant, to launch it there.

WAC started Savers because its existing credit programmes were not reaching the poorest members of the community. We wanted a credit arrangement from which small-time savers and traders would benefit. Savers loans out small amounts of money which are guaranteed by savings, and in this way WAC Savers is very like a Credit Union.

But there are also differences to your Credit Unions. Dandora has about 300,000 residents who are spread across five ’phases’ of housing. Savers has a group for each ’phase’ of the area, and weekly meetings take place in each. Within each group members guarantee each others’ loans, through their savings. If one member of the group struggles to make repayments, the other members will have to pay on their behalf, and get the money back somehow at a later date. This is important, as it means that group members must know and trust each other enough to guarantee each other’s loans.

Through these regular meetings members have come to know one another and what businesses they are involved in. The beauty of this is that people have become market and customers to one another. They buy household and shop products, and also get services like hairdressing, from one another. We think this is great as they are able to mutually promote each other’s enterprises. Members also discuss how they started their businesses. What we have noticed in these 'market place of ideas', a lot of education and awareness building goes on. Those without viable business ideas, get them from those with them. And in a number of cases people have put into practice ideas given by others! In this way ideas become a resource that they share to the benefit of each other.

The first real barrier that we fought with was the fact that people did not believe that we meant what we said - that we would welcome savers of such small amounts as 50 Kenyan shillings (about 40p)! Many micro-finance organizations would usually require higher amounts of savings. Initially the start was sluggish, but after some hard publicity work, the barrier is now well behind us! We currently have over 1600 members, 50% of who are from a lower income background.

Another barrier that we have removed is that of providing credit to women! In many Kenyan finance institutions women are in the minority. For WAC Savers, over 80% are women! This makes us proud as credit is a major tool of women’s empowerment. Their savings and loans have gone a long way to improve the socio-economic conditions of their families. And women borrowers repay their loans much better than men - default rate is at the minimum.

We have also overcome the barrier that people from diverse backgrounds do not save in the same place! In Savers, we have the rich, middle income and the poor saving together. We have people who come driving in their cars and others walking. We have people living in rented houses and others living in their own! We indeed have a great unity in diversity!