Industry Social Mobility Programme Launch

As hashtag#SocialMobilityDay draws to a close soon, just reflecting on the brilliant day yesterday where we launched the rail industry social mobility programme. The day started at the Academy of WM Trains Limited, our excellent hosts for the day, with opening words from Ian McConnell, and our Co-sponsors Steve White and Paul Rutter.

Steve and Paul not only shared their personal stories because hashtag#StoriesMatter, but they also shared the industry social mobility ambitions including a commitment to positively impact at least 5,000 lives and they made it clear that we want to make rail a route to progress – opening up opportunities and changing lives so that in the words of Mick Cash who is on our Industry social mobility steering group, 'no one is left behind'.

My fellow Co-chair of the industry social mobility working group, the fabulous Faizza Rumani and I then introduced the 'Magnificent 7' - our key partners that will support us to achieve our ambition: The Purpose Coalition, The Social Mobility Foundation, The Talent Foundry, The King's Trust, Youth Futures Foundation, Community Rail Network and Beyond Barriers - our industry social mobility employee network.

We then had closing words from Navleen Kalra, the Chair of the Industry social mobility programme and Saheeb Hussain then led us onto the next part of our journey. We were supported by fantastic Revenue Protection Security Managers on a @West Midlands Railway 'social mobility' train, with our own private carriage, from Birmingham New Street to Birmingham International where we then headed off to EngineeringUK's Big Bang Fair, one of the UK’s largest science and engineering events for young people. 

It was such a pleasure to talk to young people about the careers available in Rail, which many of them had never considered and neither had some of their teachers I spoke to. It was also great to talk to the inspiring volunteers, many of whom were young people who had just joined the industry.

Where you grew up, the school you went to, your family situation, and whether you’ve had opportunities to start again after setbacks can all shape the chances you have. But those factors shouldn’t define your future. 

Thank you to my partner in making the day happen - Faizza Rumani - you are amazing and it was great working with you on this and all the work we are continuing to do on industry social mobility. We would both like to thank so many people for their support to help us make yesterday a day to remember. I'm tagging some of the key people in the comments of this post, but there are so many more, you know who you are.

Watch this space for more as we continue to collaborate with the industry and the 'Magnificent 7' with our aim as we head towards Great British Railways of leaving no one behind. Some photos from the day are below taken by me and our two brilliant photographers, Lucy Gray and Christopher McKenna.

Check out the full LinkedIn article about the launch event here - launch event here