Author Archives: Peter Holbrook

As I prepare for my trip to China and New Zealand with the British Council to meet the business and social enterprise community sectors there, plus a week’s holiday to Australia to see family, I’m reflecting on an interesting few weeks here in the UK.  The launch of Big Society Capital has been overshadowed in the media by those lobbying the government to do a U-turn on their proposal to cap tax relief on charitable donations.  Quite rightly the story is just running and running, charities rely heavily on major donors and any action that may dissuade those with stacks of cash from giving it away was always going to be met with weighty opposition. I wonder what the government will have decided by the time I return from my travels.  Will the Treasury give in to the pressure?  Will DC put pressure on Osborne to do something, anything, just to stop the mounting criticism?  This certainly isn’t about the coalition making tough decisions in difficult times.  Instead it looks like the government departments aren’t talking to one another and are now airing their confused laundry in public.  Oops.  This is a shame because the launch of Big Society Capital was a real win.  Social investment was put on the global map, right here in the UK.

The challenge that lies before us is to grow the social investment market, that is worth £160m a year.  The injection of £600m from Big Society Capital is a welcome boost, but the next step is for the Government to put some levers in place that will attract serious investment, including ones that will speak to high net worth individuals and ordinary people wanting to invest, as an alternative to – or in addition to – donating.  Philanthropy has been around for donkey’s years and in the DNA of many countries, particularly the UK and the US.  But as Ronnie Cohen (the father of social investment according to Wikipedia) pointed out on C4 News – there’s a limit to what philanthropy can do and we need to introduce social investment into the mix.

Charities are so reliant on a particular swathe of society that they’re vulnerable when an economic downturn hits or when the housing market slows, with those all-important legacies tied up in properties. We need more diversity in how the social economy is funded. More charities are becoming more enterprising and trading rather than relying on donations, because (A) it gives them far more control over how they choose to allocate their resources, (B) provides certainty, enabling longer-term planning (it’s horrible not being able to plan beyond 3 months wondering if the income is going to come in), and (C) reduces reliance on too few income streams and makes them more sustainable.  (How many of us who have worked in charities with serious fundraising arms have felt guilty wondering whether all the older people we need to pop their clogs would be doing it soon so we can reach legacy targets?) I joke, but the serious downside is that without those large sums, charities have to make very difficult decisions such as closing down front-line services – and those who suffer are those most in need: those with mental or physical illnesses, troubled families, people without roofs over their heads or clean drinking water.  The list goes on, and on and on.

By no means should we replace giving with investing, but we need to keep innovating to finance the organisations making a positive difference and helping those in need.  But it’s not going to happen without policies from the treasury that will support the social investment market.  Most importantly we need fair tax treatment for social enterprises.  While traditional investors can use schemes like the Venture Capital Trust and Enterprise Investment Scheme, that raise finance by offering tax relief to investors who purchase shares in companies, social enterprises and charities can’t access these schemes because they often don’t have shareholders.  The social enterprise sector, while becoming less dependent on government funding, still is.  To make the transition to independence it needs a fully-functioning social investment market, which requires fair tax treatment.

There is currently only one tax incentive that social enterprises can access and that is Community Investment Tax Relief (CITR).  The fact that it was introduced in 2002 and only £63 million has since been raised speaks volumes.  It just isn’t working.  CITR scheme gives 25% tax relief (income or corporation tax) to investors who invest in accredited intermediaries. But these levels of relief are lower than the equivalent schemes for traditional investors.  And social enterprises are also losing out because individuals aren’t able to receive tax relief for direct investments made in social enterprises, which is limiting direct investment from high net worth investors, as well as family and friends.

This is unfair, which is why at Social Enterprise UK we are about to launch the ‘fair tax’ campaign (exact title not yet decided), starting with letters to the Chancellor.  You might say we’re striking while the iron’s hot.  The Treasury is, by now, probably very aware that it cannot work in isolation.  Social and economic policy making needs to come together.  More detail about the campaign – exactly what we’re going to be asking for and how people and organisations can get involved will follow soon.

I’ll take this opportunity to say a very big thank you to everybody that we’re working with.  Our networks are growing by the day and we’re building some very special relationships.  Together we are stronger – and our voices louder.

See you in May.

Peter

It seems as is if some sort of political consensus has emerged. The continued upward redistribution of wealth, perpetuated by mainstream capitalism is squeezing almost everyone; the exception is an ever smaller minority – those within the significant asset owning classes – households with generous pension pots, mortgage-free, sizeable homes or city based apartments, share holdings and investments.

Over 40% of households fear they will not be able to afford their energy bills. Unemployed people are forced into working for Megacorp for weeks and months without any tangible return for their unpaid endeavours, let alone wages. An increasing number of housing estates across the UK are approaching depressing new heights of worklessness and those very organisations that have traditionally been expected to patch up some of our society’s worst failings are facing the brunt of public sector budget cuts and donor fatigue.

The continued funnelling of wealth in an upward direction, with ever greater gusto, threatens the ever-more threadbare fabric of our society – something evidenced by an ever growing army of research into quality of life and citizen happiness.  Whilst many of our leaders tut loudly at the spiralling inequality within our society and call glibly for better business practices, the ideas for genuine reform are at best disappointingly modest and at worst intentionally vague.

Even if, and its a big if, growth returns to the European and American economies anytime soon, unless we can remodel our economies and generate a form of capitalism which is incentivised to share wealth and reduce negative impact, then growth alone will not help repair the societies in which we live and equip our communities and housing estates to become prosperous, sustainable, aspirational or fair.

The UK has attempted to ape social and economic policy originating in the US for decades, an article in today’s New York Times quoting a report published by United States Census Bureau perhaps provides an insight to our country’s future unless we take bold and radical strides to reform capitalism and the continued concentration of wealth. The report  shows that 100 Million US citizens, more than 1 in 3, are now ‘deep poor’ ‘poor’ or ‘near poor’.

As many of us that have worked in economically challenged communities know poverty is not just about the lack of money.  As Michael Harrington (author of the landmark book The Other America) observed in 1962 “Poverty should be defined psychologically in terms of those whose place in society is such that they are internal exiles who, almost inevitably, develop attitudes of defeat and pessimism and who are therefore excluded from taking advantage of new opportunities.”

We need to shift quickly, through tax breaks and through education and reward new radical forms of fair, responsible and wealth redistributing  capitalism, we must re- invigorate  the connection and moral responsibility our business leaders have  and insist on a better understanding of, and commitment to our society.  Incentivising a new generation of business models is not an immediate solution but tackling the trends that undermine our vision of how a civilised society can function should be the only game in town right now.

Giving shareholders the opportunity to veto extraordinary executive pay, calling for more employee share ownership is better than nothing and is a welcome small step in our direction but neither of these measures alone will address the systematic disfunctionality built into ‘free market capitalism’. For many years, the social enterprise movement has campaigned to level the playing field so we can compete in the market place fairly with our big corporate cousins; we continue to be discriminated against by commissioning frameworks, tax incentives and access to finance. In my view a level playing field is far too under ambitious for our sector given the lessons learned during the ongoing economic crisis; If the government and opposition are really serious about reforming market based capitalism then tipping the playing field in our collective favour is the only long term solution to our social and economic woes  and offers the only hope to tackling the ever greater divisions and an ever growing gulf and detachment between rich and poor.

Sad news about Steve Jobs. I woke early yesterday morning to hear the news on Radio 4. He was cited as the most culturally important person of the last 30 years. The news was accompanied by a number of Jobs’ insightful quotes, but this one really stands out for me: “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking, and don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it.”

I’m sure there’s going to be a lot of Jobs’ quotes in the media in the coming weeks and I apologise for being quite so obvious, but I love some of what he said as much as I like the products that he was integral in developing. At age 56 it’s a sad, tragic loss.

As Jobs knew, employee engagement and loyalty is much easier when you have clearly defined values to sell to your staff. It’s been shown to help with worker recruitment and retention, greatly increase productivity and reduce staff absenteeism. Running an organisation that bosses, staff and customers can have pride in isn’t just the right thing to do, but it’s the smart thing to do.

Professor Michael Porter at Harvard Business School has spoken a great deal about business creating greater shared value, and he’s not the only one. Large corporates are all too aware that people are taking a keener-than-ever interest in corporate values and sustainability when choosing with who they might develop their careers. Big businesses are also facing customer cynicism, which is at an all-time high. This is partly why I believe they are keen to work with social enterprises in ever-greater numbers. Over the past 12 months we have been working more with private businesses; we’re encouraging them to open up their supply chains to social enterprise, modernise parts of their corporate responsibility strategies and adapt their businesses to a fast-changing world by becoming ever more socially enterprising. Doing the right thing is not always at odds with profit – in many cases it can enhance it – and corporates can really engage their staff by being supportive of social enterprise. For the movement it’s an important step because we’re raising awareness of social enterprise at the heart of big business.

You may already know that PwC has invested in the Fire Station on Tooley Street, London Bridge and developed a new social enterprise hub – a base that signals their support for our sector (and will be Social Enterprise UK’s home soon). RBS Natwest has launched a new micro-credit loan fund, Microsoft’s new director of social enterprise is working very closely alongside us to maximise their sector impact and Business In The Community have launched ‘arc – Building Better Business’ a new support programme for social enterprises in London.

Relationships between the corporate sector and social enterprise sector have never been so potentially fruitful. I understand many people are concerned that our sector might be used to ‘cleanse’ the image of tarnished business that continues to behave in greedy and selfish ways, but I genuinely believe that the tide is turning and the relationships we cultivate are assessed on the balance of net-gain for society and the sector. We have engaged the corporate ear and we must wisely use this opportunity to create the biggest and best impact for our world by challenging and changing usual business doctrines.

Maybe it’s because we’re all in business that were beginning to build such productive relationships and understand how business needs to change. Business is getting this agenda much faster than many politicians – too many of whom see us as a peripheral, ideological and a marginal business sector. Ed Milliband was widely slated for talking about the role of good business, and how the predatory way of doing business needed to change. It seems odd that it wasn’t well received given that this is exactly the consensus that is emerging from business and economic analysts and across publications such as the Financial Times and the Harvard Business Review. Ed Miliband was a good friend to Social Enterprise in Government and he needs to give it support in opposition or risk having the socially-responsible business ground stolen by opponents.

We kicked off the conference season with the Liberal Democrats in Birmingham; highlights included agreeing a number of potentially impactful actions with the BIS minister Ed Davey. I just hope he can encourage the rest of his department to take social enterprise as seriously as he clearly does.

We were delighted to host our Labour Party event at Blackburne House, the social enterprise founded by my boss, and had a constructive discussion with Baroness Thornton, one of our new patrons, as well as Emily Thornbury MP, David Hanson MP and former transport minister Paul Clark about how Labour could create a clearer narrative on social justice, social enterprise and the role of good businesses in creating a fairer, more resilient economy. Themes that (surely by some coincidence) made their way into the leader’s speech later that day. I also shared a CBI platform with Helen Goodman MP and would have loved to accept her invitation to go for a dance if it wasn’t for a pre-booked train home!

We had a great breakfast with our minister Nick Hurd at the Conservative conference. He gave his time generously and is clearly sincere in his support for our shared aspirations for the sector. We had a collective discussion about some really important issues including the Social Enterprise Bill and the future of the Work Programme. I doubt it could be a more challenging time for any OCS minister than it is right now, but Nick’s knowledge of the sector and his obvious commitment to it creates the best hope we have of getting Government to take us more seriously and deliver on their pre-election commitments.

We also held a lively fringe meeting – thank you to our members for coming along. It was chaired by the Guardian’s Patrick Butler with John Coulthard (Microsoft’s director of social enterprise) and Richard Fuller (MP for Bedford). If you haven’t come across Richard then you should make yourself aware of him. A great orator, entertaining company and a fabulous and intelligent proponent of our sector. He gave a provocative and energetic analysis of what needs to happen to grow social enterprise: risk, more risk, planning for failure, capitalisation, innovation, localism and a revolution in commissioning. He’s an exceptional asset and one to watch.

What of the PM’s speech? The only thing I could think was where has the Big Society gone? It featured lightly with just two mentions. I’m guessing we’ll have to wait and see what happens there. So the conference season is over and life returns to some sort of normality.

Our conference activities are only made possible through the love and support of some of our members so thanks to P3, Sandwell CCT, HCT and Locality. Your investment on behalf of the whole sector is very much appreciated. As is the tireless work of the policy team here at Social Enterprise UK to get these meetings and events organised in the first place. A really big thank you.

See you all soon,
Peter

Today we reveal the findings from Fightback Britain – our report on the findings of the State of Social Enterprise survey which we carried out earlier this year. We chose the name because the evidence shows that social enterprises are trading, growing, diversifying and starting up fast in the UK’s most deprived communities. This is the stuff of economic fightback, and we hope politicians, commissioners and consumers pay heed and choose social enterprise in the future.

You’ll know only too well that social enterprises are by no means finding it an easy climate. I’m only too aware that some of our members, doing some of the most incredible work, with some of the most vulnerable communities, are fighting for survival. So much uncertainty remains that forward planning is for many, limited to no more than a 3-month view.

But alongside those businesses that are desperately looking to adjust, adapt and survive are social enterprises that are growing, thriving and seizing opportunities. PM training is one such company that has added to its growing family of businesses by buying two further businesses and converting them to social enterprises – delivering impact and profit – profit that may well eventually be made available to fuel growth for other businesses in our sector. Jan Golding at Roots HR, another SE UK member, tells me she has never been busier. HCT Group have added another £8m to their business portfolio over the last 7-8 months, growing their overall turnover by more than 25% and Cool to Care is achieving growth, attracting investment and transforming the quality of care right across the country. London Early Years Foundation continues to grow its portfolio of nurseries and shrink its reliance on public sector funding.

The experience in Scotland continues to make the country an attractive prospect and a safer bet for both existing social enterprises and start-ups. On a recent trip to Scotland I had the privilege of meeting the CEO of 10,000 hours CIC – an organisation that I believe has the ambition, drive and creativity to develop it into a multi-million pound business within only a few years. It’s not just their plans for growth that are astonishing – it’s the way they’re co-operating with a range of community groups, charities, other social enterprises and neighbourhoods to really turn the football club (St. Mirren) into a true community asset. The Scottish Government are also investing significant resource in bespoke business support for social enterprises across Scotland, something that’s still sadly lacking in England.

The report we publish today shows that the trend across the UK is that many social enterprises that continue to achieve growth are doing so by evolving their products and services into business-to-business markets and by trading directly with consumers. We all know that times are tough but social enterprises are incredibly innovative. Most are not accepting the current situation, many are adapting to these uncertain times with energy and vigour and doing all they can to ensure that the impact they generate will be safeguarded by being more entrepreneurial than ever.

Thank you for your ongoing support of what we at Social Enterprise UK are trying to do on your behalf, I can assure you that those of us working in infrastructure organisations right across the third sector face the same challenges as many of you are experiencing right now. We’re trying to be as enterprising as we can be to ensure our own impact continues to develop and grow. As always we need your stories of what is happening within your businesses so we can influence thinking as we did with the development of Chris White’s Social Enterprise Bill, and with realisation of the Big Society Bank now called Big Society Trust and Big Society Capital. We hope you like the report and our new bolder approach to our communications with the new brand of Social Enterprise UK. But the best is yet to come – you’ll have a new web platform from us in 6 or 7 weeks that promises a new approach to the way our ever-growing membership interacts with us and should deliver new ways of finding the support you’ve told us you need and find useful.

I look forward to seeing many of you as we embark on the ever-busy party conference circuit next month. We’ll be pushing for sector-specific business support to be made available; for a new bespoke regulatory framework for social investors; for the government to make good on its commitment to see that at least 25% of all public sector budgets are spent with SME’s by revolutionizing the way commissioning and procurement decisions are made. And we’ll be pushing to ensure that all politicians recognise that social enterprise is not just good for social value but that it is also about creating the sustainable economic renaissance our country and communities so desperately need.

There was something quite delicious in seeing a social enterprise newspaper (for me the Guardian with its ownership sitting with the Scott Trust is a social enterprise, however they describe themselves!) be value led, tenacious, committed, and ultimately seek to protect democracy and ensure that the laws of the land are applied to all, no matter what their position in our society.

I know the rolling news can become repetitive and as a result a wee bit tiresome, but let us never forget just how serious this piece of news is. It’s not about celebrities’ right to privacy being infringed. It’s not even about the appalling and unbelievable decisions made to invade the lives of families affected by dreadful crimes. It’s about a private company having vast influence, verging on control of our democracy, having been exposed. Well done to The Guardian, Chris Bryant MP, Norman Fowler MP and Tom Watson MP – all of whom were under all sorts of pressure to back down and go away.

But whilst the story keeps unravelling, other pieces of news have been almost entirely lost. The ‘opening public services’ white paper emerged yesterday with more of a whimper than a bang. We were all mightily frustrated. We worked hard to make the voice of social enterprise be heard; we were even lined up be on Radio 4 Today, then the PM programme, but the story was dropped at the last minute as more News International revelations emerged. One might say a good day to bury bad news.

The white paper (though actually positive in parts) poses as serious a threat to our public services and to the vision of a more plural economy in which social enterprises can grow their contribution to economic and social recovery – and demonstrate that Big Society isn’t just about volunteering.

I’m concerned that these proposed reforms will create an unequal playing field in which social enterprises are unable to compete with large private sector providers for public sector contracts. In too many instances we still struggle to find the capital required or do not have the scale to compete with big private businesses in public sector markets, where the commissioning process favours the big – and by design excludes the small and the medium.

The frustration of government that a public sector monopoly stifles efficiency, innovation and value will not be resolved by replacing a public sector monopoly with a private sector oligopoly. It hasn’t worked in transport deregulation or the introduction of competition following the privatisation of our utilities. And the risks of getting it wrong in other parts of the public sector are very, very serious.

Yes reform is necessary, but these plans must protect our shared interests in public services, not put them at risk. Without the necessary safeguards, these proposals will allow big private providers to dominate public sector markets. Taxpayers’ money will flow into profit seeking organisations that exist only to satisfy the needs of their shareholders. Public services must operate for the communities and people they serve, nobody else.

The Government’s plans to extend Payment by results will put private sector organisations at an automatic advantage. They’ll simply use their stronger balance sheets and ability to attract private investment to win contracts.

We only have to look to the Department for Work and Pensions Work Programme to see that when markets open up, large private sector providers move in and squeeze out smaller organisations. A tiny proportion of the contracts went to social enterprises despite it being hailed by Government as a boost for the Big Society. What happened to the WISE group in Scotland was scandalous and had their whole value been considered within their tender they would surely have romped home to victory. Their smaller size and access to capital was their downfall, NOT the quality, design or track record in delivery – all of which I know were outstanding.

A You Gov poll carried out for us shows that people do not want the private sector to run public services. Our research was carried out before the Southern Cross debacle and there’ll be even more cynicism now about big corporations and their involvement in our national treasures. It is encouraging that the majority of those surveyed said they wanted public services to be run by social enterprises. We hope the politicians are taking note of this public opinion.

The important question now is how serious is the Government’s want for social enterprises and mutuals to play a bigger role in public service delivery. The country’s policy makers need to lever in investment and infrastructure to ensure that there are enough of them in the marketplace able to deliver. But the £10million support programme announced by ministers last year to do just that, has not yet materialised. It’s an anxious waiting game.

I am aware that social enterprises out there delivering public services share my fears. A few glimpses of the trends emerging from the forthcoming state of social enterprise survey – due early August – say they are. We are all becoming increasingly uneasy if the opportunities promised by Government will materialise:

Social enterprises trading mainly with the public sector anticipate they will make half of all the likely redundancies within the social enterprise business community over the next 12 months.

Social enterprises doing most of their business with the public sector view the coming years with gloom, with markedly lower business confidence than their social enterprise peers trading with consumers and private businesses.

Of the social enterprises trading mainly with the public sector, two-thirds anticipate that their growth will come from diversifying away from working with the public sector (64%).

These are sombre findings in tough times. But we won’t give up the fight.

Till next time.

Peter

(And why the Premier League is making my blood Boyle…)

I’m sure many of us have considered the Southern Cross debacle within recent weeks. Was this inevitable? Is this a taste of things to come for other outsourced public services? An investigation by the Financial Times has recently shown that the quality of care in one in seven privately run homes in England was rated “poor” or “adequate” by the government regulator. These low ratings indicate potentially serious problems such as a failure to adequately to feed or clean residents. By contrast, the low ratings applied to just one in 11 homes run by non-profit organisations or local authorities (based on April 2010 ratings from the regulator the Care Quality Commission).

Of course there are excellent privately run care homes, but it appears the desire to deliver profits in excess of what might normally be expected – by carving up the company several years ago – has led to a serious crisis.

To me it seems there are three options:

The ultimately inevitable government bailout of Southern Cross happens and the status quo limps on, on the basis they become financially viable of the business. But this seems to be unlikely given many costs (staff) have already been cut to the bone. How they will shed another 3,000 employees without further reducing the quality of care is a critical question to be answered.

That one or some of the charity residential care providers and supporters of older people – such as Leonard Cheshire, Abbeyfield and Age UK – either alone or together are encouraged to get involved in the delivery of these essential services. Although given the time pressures, risk and mission drift this would cause, it’s very unlikely. If I were in government I would not hold my breath for too long.

But there is a potential third option. One that has been missing from the debate thus far and that is the role of social enterprise. There are big questions that need answering before I can be sure that it would work, but surely we need some transformative thinking here rather than how we patch up a model of care that simply can’t work.

I’m suggesting that we form a new CIC Ltd by share; let’s call it ‘Fair Care’. We appoint an executive board with a power-house chairperson who government will listen to and we make government a shareholder, perhaps with a golden share. We recruit sector specialists who have turned around care services before – Geoff Walker (Sandwell CCT), Victor Adebowale (Turning Point), Margaret Elliot (Sunderland Homecare) and Maria Mills (SCA Group). We bring in a couple of former local authority CEO’s or directors of social care, some social financiers – and have a couple of government seats on the board. And then we bring in the experts who can sense check a business plan in a tight time frame.

The ‘Fair Care’ CIC board is socially driven, bespoke and fit for purpose, but it doesn’t deliver – it oversees delivery and commissions from local and national charities. It’s a kind of ‘network rail’ solution only much, much better. Equity investment could potentially come from church resources and perhaps from charity reserves – particularly those involved in older people’s care. Investment could flow from private sources and from government too.

Charities big and small could deliver the operational side – they get rate relief and an 80% reduction in rates is a very substantial saving for care homes – often the equivalent to four or five full time staff! Then throw in the power of social enterprise delivery models – their ability to create value through staff engagement, training, recruitment and staff retention. We know that social enterprise care homes (most of which have charitable status often because of the tax relief available) have driven down costs, not by cutting staff but by driving up productivity, reducing absenteeism, co designing services with carers and beneficiaries, and leveraging vast amounts of social capital and genuine value through the trust they have developed with their stakeholders. Can you ever imagine a local community volunteering or raising funds to support the endeavours of Southern Cross? Or an elderly resident bequeathing their estate to a PLC?

Of course it’s not as easy as it seems. There are many questions that require clarification and lots of hurdles too. What are the liabilities? What is the working capital required from government and loan investment? How investible is this new business model? What are the terms and conditions of existing contracts with local authorities? The lease arrangements and opportunities to negotiate with the Southern Cross property company? The TUPE implications?

But if we’re given some of the answers to these questions then a social enterprise solution can be found. And the well being, security and safety of the most vulnerable people within our society must be found alongside a trusted long-term approach to the care of older people.

Crisis is a great opportunity for innovation, fresh thinking and for the delivery of new approaches. Let’s hope the government sees the opportunity beyond the crisis. I’m asking our sector to come forward with more ideas, more questions and to contribute to the debate. I believe this could be an opportunity for social enterprise – and for the principles in Big Society – to shine.

Let’s get a roundtable organised, thrash out the details and make a coherent case to government that this is an area where transformative thinking is required.

Peter

An important ps.

I was absolutely gutted to hear that Dave Boyle, CEO from Supporters Direct (one of our members), was forced to resign following a twitter outburst about MK Dons, franchise football and the Premier League’s role in the whole thing. I was with Dave the day after AFC Wimbledon were promoted to the Football League after our original club was bought and moved nine years ago. I had a couple of celebratory pints with him. He’s a great guy and has achieved a vast amount with Supporters Direct for the benefit of football, rugby league fans and communities right across the country.

For AFC Wimbledon and other social enterprise football clubs that are community owned, the withdrawal of Supporters Direct funding and the Premier League’s insistence that it had lost faith in the organisation’s leadership following the indiscreet tweet, is just another sign that the Premier League is out of step with the people.

Lots more to say, but no time to say it, so I’ll try and blog again very soon. Thanks for all your personal messages of support over the last couple of weeks – it means a lot.