Our aim was to inform local women about the changes to their State Pension age and influence MPs and local politicians to understand the impact of the changes and support the campaign.
Devon WASPI were invited to become involved in a major arts project in Plymouth. The aim of the project was to “…..how do we as individuals, as the public, get our voices heard within or against the structures of power that govern our lives an claim to speak for us, the people?”
Group members were invited to become involved. One of the volunteers was appointed to lead and became the key contact person for everyone. The volunteers from the group attended four evening sessions, starting with designing practice pieces – these were aprons which read “Older Person Working Champion”, this was a tongue in cheek reference to the announcement of the introduction of this role into Jobcentres. Sadly when WASPI women went to Jobcentres to enquire staff had no idea what they were talking about. It transpired that only 6 individuals carried this title across the country and it was a role tagged onto their current jobs rather than a specialist role. The women involved in the project believed they were doing a better job of representing older workers than the Jobcentres so made use of the title for the aprons. The group decided they wanted to produce a large banner to use at demonstrations and events and at the end of the four weeks had a huge banner which was displayed as part of the project at Plymouth art venues. At the end of the project the banner and aprons were handed over to Devon WASPI and have been used at many events. We were keen to use the project to highlight the WASPI issue and wrote a press release which we distributed to local media outlets. We also made contact with the BBC and ITV South West region and were successful in a lengthy piece on the regional news on the BBC. WASPI women were interviewed, the banners shown, this also publicised the art project so the collaboration paid off for the project as a whole. We had a series of articles in local newspapers too.
The project was different from the events demonstrations and lobbying that we had been doing. It was great for building confidence amongst our members – no-one had ever been involved in anything “artistic” before, those who attended learned new skills and were gifted with print resources to carry on making art. The project was seen as politically neutral so media who were uneasy about featuring WASPI in normal circumstances were happy to show the campaign in a positive light Even group members who were not involved with WASPI at the time of the project take great delight in marching behind the banner. The project also raised the profile of the local group within WASPI with a feature in the Member’s Newsletter and in national social media outlets. Photo 1 shows the banner in action with members (and their husbands and partners) from across the country marching with and behind it at the Tolpuddle Martyrs Festival. Image by Valerie French.
On a purely practical note I think we would remember that banners are meant to be carried and they get heavy after a while. The banner looks great but is not an easy carry, it would have been useful to consider that during production. The volunteers involved in the project were left to decide what they wanted to do and that worked very well. To limit or restrict their vision of the outcome would have had a negative effect, stifling creativity and increasing nervousness. Volunteers were very conscious that what they were creating was a reflection of the struggle for thousands of women, they needed nothing further. Developing a press release gave other group members the opportunity to support and introduce the topic to the media. This also ensured that key points were included and full acknowledgement made of the art project.
Sandra Broadbent
