Collaborative office spaces for social enterprises planned for Portsmouth city centre

A meeting about the social enterprise hub took place on Monday morning, October 25, at the proposed location on Edinburgh Road, Portsmouth.

At the meeting, John Meritt, director of Social Enterprise Link - which facilitates opportunities and gives support to social enterprises - told Portsmouth South MP Stephen Morgan about the plans to convert the old language school into a hub for social enterprises.

John said the hub would be an ‘ideal place’ for start-up businesses and smaller organisations to operate and collaborate with other social enterprises in the area.

The plan is to offer rented office space to organisations, providing both short-term and long-term tenancies. There are also ideas to make the ground floor lobby space into a cafe and a collaborative space for students.

John said he has received interest from a number of organisations who would like to be involved, including Lily and Lime and Extinction Rebellion. He has also been in talks with The Hive, Portsmouth councillors and has already secured a grant for the project from The Reach Fund.

John said: ‘The end of this year is probably the earliest we’d have that written plan that we can go to the landlords and funders, to say this is a viable plan that we’ve had interest in and would be able to start very soon.’

The three storey building was previously occupied by TEG English language school, and would require significant renovations including a lift installation to make the building fully accessible.

Stephen Morgan MP was supportive of the plans and the protection of the voluntary sector, which has been so important for the community over the past 18 months.

He said: ‘During the pandemic, the voluntary sector and charities have really stepped up, in terms of encouraging volunteering and helping the most vulnerable, and I think as we recover from the pandemic we need to make sure that our voluntary sector and our social enterprises are in a really strong place for the future.’

‘One way of doing that is by making sure they’ve got access to affordable meeting space, so the vision here to provide that is really exciting.’

Geoff Wade, CEO of Community Empowerment Ltd, said it’ll be a great way to bring people together and allow the organisations to mutually support one another.

He said he is pleased with the support the project has already received from local authorities, and hopes to receive further financial support from the council and the government.

He said: ‘We would be looking at government funding through the local authorities, through things like the Future High Street Fund, which are made available to bring life back into the city centre.’John and Geoff are keen to hear from local people and organisations who want to get involved. To get in touch, email John at john@socialenterpriselink.co.uk or visit socialenterpriselink.co.uk.