With the UK Co-op Congress held in Birmingham, there was a strong showing of co-ops from the region – including a session hosted by John Robb, looking at the West Midlands Ownership Hub.
The hub was set up to support worker ownership in the creative industries – yet another sector that has found itself caught between multiple crises.
Richard Parker, mayor of West Midlands Combined Authority, said the initiative was designed to support people in the creative sector, who often work alone and “find themselves subject to decisions made further up the food chain”.
The state of the sector, with freelance creatives working out of the loop and missing opportunities, is holding talented people back, said Parker. “We needed a way to bring that talent together … we thought they might benefit from working collectively in a more joined up way.”
His authority was also keen to build up the co-op movement and encourage an economy around social purposes. And investments are being made in the creative sector to attract production – including an ongoing relationship with the BBC and Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, and a film studio from Mumbai.
This will created pipeline of work, said Parker – from animation and creative design to film set construction. “And we want them to have ownership models based on co-operative ways of working.”
Related: West Midlands Ownership Hub launch
Local community benefit societies include the Developer Society, which designs websites, databases and other digital services for third sector clients. Creative director and co-founder Steve Hawkes said there were challenges in converting to the model, although it was “more aligned with our values”. For starters there was a “challenging conversation with bank” which said the model was suited for “small community centres and allotments … we upset their pie charts”.
Next, they to reinvent their ways of collaborating, with existing products based on hierarchical structures unsuited to co-op working. “We’re working with the hub now to ensure other co-ops don’t have to jump through same hoops,” he said.
ITZATNA Arts, which creates cross-cultural collaborations with artists and diaspora communities in Mexico, Latin America, and the UK, is a new addition to the West Midlands co-op scene. Co-director and producer Sebas Hau said the organisation is still on a learning curve and stressed the importance of publicising the co-op model.
“It’s good to put the information out there so people know about co-op model instead of being shoehorned into one that doesn’t work for them,” he said.
Hau praised the support received from the hub, as did Riley Tang, creative director and co‑founder of Five Senses, a co-op of five creatives from Hong Kong.
Five Senses formed a year ago through the hub’s network, said Tang. It was given development support and guidance and in March this year incorporated as a co-op.
When it comes to awareness of the model, Parker said: “A key part of my role has to be about advocacy and promotion … I’m here to support you, I want to be an advocate for you … I want to visit high streets and business that are using and promoting this this model.
“More practically, I’ll be asking the officers that work for me to look for ways we can support the sector more.”
This means more advocacy on the ground, he said, especially bearing in mind the relevance of the co-op model “across our communities if we’re going to deal with some of the big challenges we face around division, and the loss of cohesion and mutual respect around some of our most vulnerable and challenged places.”
