I work at community centres and am witnessing the struggle with everyday life, bills and a lack of opportunities.

Full statement

It doesn't have to be this way and the council can make all the difference.



https://www.islingtontribune.co.uk/article/woolly-wonders-get-knitting-for-hospital-baby-unit - "

Members of the group at work – Sandra, Judy, Patricia, Wendy, organiser Devon, and Christine

A WOMAN’S knitting group has proved highly popular at a Highbury community centre after some of the service users showed the others how to “cast on”.

The women at Elizabeth House Community Centre have been knitting sets for the Neo-Natal unit at the Whitting­ton Hospital, inclu­ding making “bonding squares” – a knitted square which a mother would hold close to their body until it takes on their scent and then put in their baby’s incubator unit to comfort them.

Christine Richardson, a grandmother of nine, has spent the past month showing the other women how to knit, as has service user Wendy Turner.

Ms Richardson, who grew up on the Blackstock estate opposite the community centre in Hurlock Street, said she first learned to knit at the age of five when another woman from her block spent a summer teaching her.

She said: “I’ve been very fortunate. My daughter was born at the Whittington a little prematurely but she didn’t need to go into an incubator. Another week and it would have been a problem.

“It’s nice to be able to knit for the babies.”

The women’s support group – which is free and open to all – has been running since August.

Community organiser Devon Osborne said watching some of the women’s confidence “flourish” had been “the best accomplishment in my life”, adding: “There’s a saying: whatever you make didn’t exist in the world before you made it. It’s a better place because you made something.” "