8 |
drinkanddrugsnews
| July 2012
Cover story |
Social enterprise
www.drinkanddrugsnews.com
Can Cook, a Liverpool-based social
enterprise, is aiming to shake up the
rehabilitation of ex-offenders and people
with substance problems. David Gilliver
speaks to its director, Robbie Davison
Recipe for reha
‘I
f rehabilitation is going to be achieved it will only be by smaller agencies
creating a critical mass,’ says Robbie Davison. ‘The larger agencies, to be
honest, have never, ever delivered it. Otherwise you wouldn’t have
recidivism in the state that it is.’
A 20-year-plus veteran of the social enterprise sector, Davison is director of
Liverpool-based Can Cook, which was established in 2006 to tackle problems of
poor diet in the city by encouraging people to cook for themselves. The organisation
is made up of a professional cookery studio, catering service, café and more, and is
now embarking on an ambitious new project to launch kiosks selling ‘healthy street
food’ in cities across the UK.
As he explained to delegates at the second national
Innovations in drug and
alcohol recovery conference
in Harrogate last month, the kiosks will be staffed by
ex-offenders, people recovering from drug or alcohol problems and others –
‘rehabilitation of any kind’ – with the aim that they then either become Can Cook
franchisees or use their skills and experience to move into self-employment. ‘We’re
starting in Liverpool, and there’ll be ten kiosks in each city centre,’ says
Davison. ‘What we’re looking to do every single year is create 20 posts in
each city, and there’ll be a support team of about ten wrapped around
each 20. It’s a high-end model – it’s about quality not quantity.’
An initial six-week course will see people trained intensively
in cooking, customer service and sales and will also
determine if they’re right for the project. If they are, the
training will continue throughout the first year of
employment, with the vendors each having a 70 per
cent stake in the profit from sales as well as a bonus of
£5,000 at the end of the year. ‘That means if they work
well, and our model works well, they’ll earn about £25-
28,000 a year,’ he says. ‘McDonald’s pay their managers
about £24,000.’
He’s adamant however that the project will also need
to genuinely change people’s behaviour in order to really
be considered a success. ‘It’s not worth anything
otherwise,’ he says. ‘Unless something changes behaviour
and campaigns on the issues, it shouldn’t really be called
a social enterprise.’
To back this up, universities in each of the cities where
Can Cook operates will audit the scheme, he says. ‘I want
it independently, objectively, audited, so it’s not us saying
what a great thing it is. I want others to come in and work
alongside us to say, “that’s not good enough”, because that
makes a powerful social statement. Unless you try to reach
quality now – and a mass of quality – in a year or two’s time
everybody will be running around trying to pick up the scraps.’
This is the inherent risk in ‘doing rehabilitation in a
recession’, he stresses. ‘You have to stay at the quality end of the