Thread by @PublicPriestley

(apologies Twitter is about to die so it sent my last tweet series at tweet 12 for no reason whatsoever - please find that and start at number 1 for this epic and very true story)

We contacted the Department for Education - very proud of what we were achieving and the way forward. We could help the DfE with our learned experiences, and if they gave us a modest amount of funding, for absolutely no profit and with free labour, we would roll out more. 13/28

I underline - we told them NO PROFIT and NO LABOUR COSTS. They wrote back to us and thanked us for our effort in a patronising letter that said they couldn't help us and that they had this situation under control. 14/28

Surprised by this - because our members were in schools and we knew full well that they absolutely did not have this aspect of the crisis under control at all and were entirely preoccupied by other things, we wrote again. 15/28

They wrote back to us. Patted us on the head for doing so well but asked us to understand that they had shit under control and it was all good. Thanks but no thanks. Additionally they stated that it would breach the ministerial code and be unethical to support us (ahem). 16/28

I wrote to my local MP to express my dismay - because the VIP Fast Lane bullshit was already starting to be reported on in the media and PPE contracts were being awarded to very dubious people. Also James Dyson was making medical equipment as were Aston Martin. WTF 17/28

My MP is none other than the jungle hero himself, the polo neck wearing man who was busy throwing a protective ring around care homes. Not all heroes wear capes. 18/28

Matt Hancock himself passed our letter through to the then Minister of State for School Standards, Nick Gibb MP. 19/28

Nick Gibb rushed back - recognising that we were doing an awesome job and made sure that we got a modest amount of funding to allow these empowered young people to keep on making the difference. [needle scratch] No he didn't. Not at all. 20/28

We got a letter back with a polite thank you that asked us to go away. This letter wasn't sent to me directly, but to Hancock, and someone that works for Hancock emailed it to me 21/28

They wanted to help. They really did. But rules are rules and there was nothing they could do to help a plucky group of young people in a community distributing computers to an entire county 22/28

In the 2020/2021 academic year we distributed more computers to the schools of Cambridgeshire than the Department for Education. In fact the inventor of the Raspberry Pi computer, Eben Upton said this: 23/28

In the fullness of time and across all of the lockdowns we distributed more than 1,400 computers, laptops, ipads, desktops across Cambridgeshire & Peterborough to children of all ages based entirely on need alone. 24/28

Nobody made a single penny in profit - except perhaps the companies we bought components from. Not Eben Upton though - he refused to make a single penny from our work and gave us at cost access to anything his company could supply (and he still does). 25/28

We were recognised with the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough COVID Community Champions award at Parliament (one Tory MP arrived at the ceremony behaving obnoxiously and smelling strongly of drink). My son, then 15, was most unimpressed. 26/28

This year we received an award from BBC Radio Cambridgeshire in their 'Make a Difference Awards' as the Community Group category winner. 27/28

We remain bemused that for all our efforts not a penny was given to support us by central government despite our persistent efforts to gain their support. We remain convinced that because nobody got a kick back and there was no profit involved they weren't interested. 28/28

BTW postscript - Michele Mone right? Michele f*cking Mone.

This was a delivery of computers to my house in the early days when we were raising money and buying new.

This crazy gang of local bikers heard about what we were doing and they drove our computers all of the county for us, delivering them. Mad as a box of frogs and utterly brilliant.

The thing is if we did it for free it threatened the premise that other people needed to make a profit? No?

BTW - our next endeavour is to deliver a Christmas fair (17th & 18th Dec) to the least well off and most vulnerable children of our local area. If you can afford to support this, please visit gofund.me/4cd380ed to find out more.