Simon’s Blog (the official one)

The Future Choices - Live & Local conference was something to be proud of with well over 300 people descending on the market town of Skipton, with ruralnet|uk’s inclusion objectives at least partially fulfilled by the parallel, and on-going, online activity happening at futurechoices.ruralnet.org.uk.

For ruralnet|uk, the journey to Skipton began in November 2007 when I met up again with Andy Tordoff at the BURA Awards and Andy asked if we (ruralnet|uk) would be able to repeat the Yorkshire Forward/ruralnet|uk double act of 2005 and work together again to deliver ruralnet|2008 in Yorkshire. Well, a lot has happened since then. Over the last nine months we’ve moved from running a stand-alone event, to running a stand-alone event back to back with the Action For Market Towns convention, to a merger of the two events. This provided more choice for delegates over 2, rather than 3 days

Before I go into some of the highlights for me I must thank everyone involved for their unwaivering support and ‘can do’ attitude as we ploughed through the different delivery options. Key to ruralnet|uk being able to pull this off was the partnership with Yorkshire Forward throughout. It was also brilliant that the Co-operative Bank, supporters of the ruralnet|uk conferences over many years, were happy to stay with us on this journey.

So what were the highlights for me? And please bear in mind that I couldn’t be everywhere and so I know I missed some really good stuff which I am now catching up with online.

Let’s start with day 2 with Rhona Pringle’s presentation (see photo) of a very innovative piece of work on ‘Market Towns of the Future’ which presented some potential scenarios, some negative some positive. The presentation is backed up by a significant body of work which is encapsulated in a beautifully produced report (which unfortunately I cannot find online). The objective of the work was to ensure that the right decisions are made for the future of market towns in Yorkshire and Humber but it will be of benefit to all regions in the UK.

The joint event was a lot less interactive than ruralnet|uk conferences are with a lot less time for networking. “Where are the networking boards” one person asked!

Reflecting on Day 1, the opening plenary was chaired by Catherine Hammant , the Chair of Action for Market towns, and was packed full of interesting content. Including:

• A presentation from John Craven
• A video address from Matthew Taylor
• A presentation from Terry Hodgkinson, the Chairman of Yorkshire Forward
• My attempt at a bit of interactivity - Rural Britain a 2020 Vision

In the afternoon, Catherine handed the baton to ruralnet|uk’s Chair, Simon Bland, and we heard from:

• Carole Manley, Mayor of Skipton
• Marcia, Chair of craven District Council
• Andy Tordoff of Yorkshire Forward

You can watch these presenations here. Matthew Taylor also expanded on this address through a Q & A session with me which you can watch here. If you have any questions for Matthew please ask them in the online networking area (you’ll need to register - but it’s very quick).

In my session I attempted to extract a collective vision of rural Britain in 2020 from all those in the room. This came as a bit of a shock for some - people weren’t really expecting to have to DO anything!

Anyway, at the end of the 20 minute session, we collected some 235 pieces of paper with people’s views expressed in words and pictures. These will be brought together online over the next couple of weeks and opened up for others to comment and contribute (watch this space). The aim is to come up with a vision that more than 1000 people have contributed to.

Anyway, for those of you weren’t there, there’s a chance to see what went on and watch many of the presentations online here. We’ve also captured some of the reactions from delegates. We will be continuing to upload material over the next week or so, so please re-visit.

A special thanks to all the staff involved from both AMT and ruralnet|uk including those who were unable to attend and kept things moving back at base.

It’s been great working with AMT on this joint event. Geting to know each other better and mixing our networks will inevitably lead to more and better collaboration into the future.