"AFTER 16 hours of what seems like full brain immersion in Harborough's past, present and future, I'm exhausted and I think my memory is beginning to play tricks on me. Writing this on Saturday evening, I think 'was it really just two days ago that this all started?'
One of the other delegates at Hands on Harborough likened it to taking part in a psychological experiment – we were put in a room with 60 other people and asked to carry out tasks, without really knowing where it was all leading. Acting in a TV report set in Harborough 2017 in front of lots of people I'd only met the day before, I wasn't sure at all.
But one of the great successes that leaps out in my memory is the way it was managed, as what could have turned into a big argument between strong-minded individuals in the room, was a gentle but firm coaxing towards discovering what we all agreed on. I'm not really quite sure how the organisers from Vista did it – looking back it almost seems like magic.
They were reassuring when it looked like the chaos on the wall in front of them (dozens of ripped up pieces of flipchart paper with people's various ideas written on them) was insurmountably complicated – though I think there was a slight lack of clarity in the minds of participants by Saturday (including mine) purely because we were shattered. We must have spent an hour debating what categories suggestions should come under which I think a lot of us found frustrating. It's no-one's fault, I should add, it's just that we were trying to think about such a wide range of issues – affordable housing, a new arts centre, town centre pedestrianisation, taking charge of our own destiny, the list goes on and on.
Certainly everyone in the room was given the chance to have their say. I think the only real problem with this was there were notable absences from the room of certain sections of the town's community – even though we had tried to reflect the town's diversity in who was invited to attend. Despite our efforts, there were no members of the travelling community, or migrant workers from Eastern Europe, for example, and this, I think, led to a more 'middle-class' agenda. One of the participants pointed out that our wish-list for the future did little to address the concerns of the most disadvantaged in the town – and looking at the wall as he spoke I had to agree that arts centres and traffic
management would probably do little to raise people out of poverty. At least we could be reminded that any discussions we had must reflect the need to be inclusive.
For better or worse, we got to mid morning on Saturday with five main areas to focus on – business and the economy,
cultural opportunities, a safe and strong community, the environment and social care, health and lifelong learning. However, I personally felt the final session was too short to achieve much long-term planning.
Having said that, the conversations we've spent 16 hours having, are only meant to be a starting point, so I hope that the real work will begin when we next meet on March 29.
I came home from not knowing whether I felt elated or a bit deflated – that despite the enthusiasm of those 60 people and all the great ideas they had put forward, we seemed to have left with little concrete planned.
But writing this and remembering some of those ideas again, and how fascinating and enjoyable the event had been, I'm once again enthused and am looking forward to the next meeting so I can help the process of making some of our hopes reality."

If you have any comments on Hands on Harborough, email rachel.lusby@harboroughmail.co.uk