Page 11 - Real Rochdale Issue 16 Winter 2022

interview with Vivian carter

Vivian Carter, one of RCT’s founders who is now chair of the board of

trustees, told us more about the charity’s work.

A former teacher in Heywood, Viv also worked at British Coal and

British Gas before working in her partner’s engineering workshop.

She has also taught English to French students.

What was the original aim for RCT – and has it us, we needed to be able to take the kids some-
achieved it? where neutral where we could look after them.

Absolutely and miles besides. I chaired the Not long after, he showed me the premises on
youth court in Rochdale, and we had loads of Drake Street, where I’d actually worked for a
kids coming in, offending, and they weren’t at very short time. It was empty after becoming
school. They weren’t at school because they a furniture shop, but it was for sale – I didn’t
chose not to be – and realised if they escaped know how we’d pay rent, never mind buy
the school system at 11, nobody noticed they somewhere. John said, “leave it to me.”
had gone. But that leads to offending because
they need guidance and occupation and all He managed to find support from the bank It became obvious that we needed to do more: example; we have to be based in the
those things they weren’t getting. and get us a mortgage. It was the making of we were then working in schools with kids who community, they won’t come here, so we have
us because we had a place to work from and it were not settled and needed mentoring so then to go to them. It takes time because we have to
The whole youth bench was up in arms, was a big office in those days. Now it’s not big that grew. build up trust.
saying we had to do something. I went to see enough, but it was amazing.
the deputy director of education at the council Do you run a course for men who feel they are Have you got any aims over the next five
and he knew exactly what I was talking about. How many mentors does RCT have now? at risk of committing abuse? years?
So, we drew in the head of youth services, and
head of children’s services and we formed a We have about 28, who all work one-to-one Yes. We couldn’t have men in here when we Our next move must deal with knife crime –
bit of a group and decided that we’ve got to do with kids. We soon discovered that it was had women in who had problems. So we had to somebody has to deal with all these kids who
something. alright mentoring the young people but dedicate a day where it is men only. You have to are wandering around with a knife in hand.
actually, you needed to work with the parents refer yourself: you have got to want to change
The local authority gave us a place to work and as well and – very often – that was where the your ways, otherwise we can’t do anything for Our projects present themselves: we don’t
we managed to get £20,000 from The Prince’s problem lay. you. It took us a while to get funding for this particularly think we want to do ‘this’.
Trust so we employed two people. One worked because nobody believed we could do it. Something will come up and then we make a
with children in school and the other one We quickly discovered one of the bigger family plan and try to get funding, so really, we just
worked outside on the social side - mentoring. problems was women who were being abused If you were starting RCT today, would you do take it step by step.
We decided mentoring was the way forward and not talking about it, which affects the kids. anything differently?
because they weren’t being mentored at home. Two of our staff went on a course to learn how
to help these women; supporting them in I don’t think we would. It was – and still is – To find out more about
It grew very quickly. I remember speaking to standing up for themselves and enabling them based in the community. We follow the Rochdale Connections Trust
John Kay [the current secretary of the charity] to be able to take their own lives in hand. They community’s needs to do what we do. We try to or become a volunteer mentor
and telling him that although the council had were brilliant and one of them still works here. follow what the community has a need for. Our visit www.r-c-t.co.uk
been kind enough to put us up and look after new project on Darnhill in Heywood is a good

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