Ealing Community Transport, part of national charity ECT, was named as the winner of the 2017 Social Enterprise Mark CIC ‘Making a Mark’ competition at a celebration at our recent conference in Winchester. They were presented with a special award, created for us by Designs in Mind*, a social enterprise studio of designer makers who have been referred through mental health services.
Becky Casement of ECT accepting the Making a Mark competition award from James Evans
This is the second year of the Making a Mark competition; a celebration of the vast and diverse social benefits created by Social Enterprise Mark holders, which highlights interesting examples of how accredited social enterprises are creating considerable social impact within their local communities and in wider society.
We invited James Evans of the Certification Panel to present the award, which was accepted by Becky Casement from Ealing Community Transport. James commended all the finalists on their achievements and congratulated them on making the shortlist, before presenting certificates to all the finalists who were in attendance at the conference.
Anna Whitty MBE, Chief Executive of ECT Charity, said: “We are thrilled to have been named as the winners of this year’s Making a Mark competition for our continued work to measure our social impact. We are committed to providing high quality, safe, friendly, accessible and affordable transport in local communities, so it’s really important that we can measure how well we are achieving these aims and what difference it makes.”
“In the last year alone ECT Charity has enabled more than 98,000 passenger trips for individuals and more than 60,000 group trips for over 400 community groups. We have also been able to calculate our social impact using our recently developed methodology. It allows us to demonstrate that in the past year ECT’s charitable activities have had a social value of £1.3 million; in the London Borough of Ealing alone, community transport could save up to £4.1 million annually by reducing isolation and loneliness. We are incredibly proud of these achievements and would like to thank Social Enterprise Mark CIC for their recognition of our work in this award.”
Lucy Findlay, Managing Director of Social Enterprise Mark CIC, said, “We are delighted to announce the long standing Social Enterprise Mark holder Ealing Community Transport as the 2017 ‘Making a Mark’ competition winners. They won because of their ability to demonstrate their social impact across a wide range of groups, including helping overcome social isolation. They clearly demonstrate social impact created for individuals using the transport, as well as contributing to the sustainability of local community groups. Well done to Anna and the whole ECT team.”
Selected from the diverse international network of accredited social enterprises, Ealing Community Transport was shortlisted alongside 6 other organisations, including The Big Issue Group and Epic CIC, which was named as the runner up. The competition shortlist was subject to a public vote and a separate vote by the independent Certification Panel, both of which accounted for 50% of the final result.
Maxine Willetts of Epic CIC accepting runner up certificate for the Making a Mark competition
Nigel Kershaw of Big Issue Group with James Evans and Big Issue vendor Kevin Collick
We would like to extend our congratulations to all of the competition finalists:
- Connection Crew
- Ealing Community Transport
- Emmaus Cambridge
- Epic CIC
- South Shropshire Furniture Scheme
- The Big Issue Group
- Warrington Health Plus CIC
*Designs in Mind design and make products, working in textiles, wood, wire and glass. Through their work they aim to challenge mental health stigma and the predominant culture of low expectation which surrounds their designer makers, all of whom are adults referred through mental health services.
The Making a Mark award was created by a team of designer makers, including Amy, who explains her journey at Designs in Mind in this blog post. As a result of working on this award, Amy is now volunteering for Designs in Mind in public screen printing workshops.
Please click here to find out more about Designs in Mind.
