🎧 Behind the scenes of the Great Central Gazette

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Rob Watson

Hello, it's Friday 17 February and this is a podcast from the Great Central Gazette. It's kind of the first conversation we've had together, so I'm gonna go around the table and get everybody to introduce themselves, very quickly, and you've got to say that one word that describes you in your very brief introduction. So, we'll start - we'll go around clockwise from me.

Rhys Everquill

So I'm Rhys, I'm one of the co-founders of the Gazette and I really struggled with trying to come up with one word, but I would probably say ‘hard-working.’

Megan Lupton

Oh, that was my word! Okay. Hello, I'm Megan, I'm another co-founder of the Gazette. I'm also doing a PhD at De Montfort University and do some other fun stuff, but I would probably describe myself as quite determined. I think, if I set my eyes on a goal, then I really want to achieve it.

Emma Guy

Hi, I'm Emma. I'm like the third amigo, I guess, I'm the other co-founder of the Great Central Gazette. And, at a push, if asked to think of just one word to kind of summarise myself, I think it would probably be self-defined. I think that's probably the most accurate word that covers me.

Megan Lupton

I love that.

Rob Watson

Okay. And I'm Rob Watson, and I'm a supporter of the Gazette. I kind of do stuff around community media and I don't know, I suppose – how to define myself?

It's kind of a little bit of a – kind of a fixer [who] as a generalist, does lots of different things, but tries to sort problems out. That's how I'd like to see myself, I'm not sure whether that’s how other people see me!

Emma Guy

I think that's quite accurate.

Rob Watson

As vague as it is!

So, the purpose of what we're just going to do is gonna have a nice relaxed conversation, just to kind of introduce ourselves and to think about what has motivated each of us into bringing the Gazette [forward], some support in the Gazette and how other people might get involved.

And so, now I'm gonna go anti-clockwise. So, I'm gonna go back to Emma now, because Rhys indicated that he didn't want to be thrown in at the deep end to take this because he's typically the spokesperson...

Rhys Everquill

...I don't know… picking one word is being thrown into the deep end!

Rob Watson

So, just explain to us a bit about what your- what you see your role as, Emma and how you think that will develop and what the purpose for the Gazette will be.

Emma Guy

Yeah, no, that's a really good question – and for people that don't know, I mean, this has been a year in the making. So, my role has kind of shifted throughout that, from originally Rhys coming to me with the concept and saying, “do you think I'm mad for, for doing this? Do you think it's a good idea?”

And then me coming on board and supporting and saying, “no, I actually think it's brilliant.” And [thinking] if we can pull it off, then it will be something really worthwhile doing and hopefully something great for the community.

So, now I would describe myself sort of a year on as being a community organiser and supporting editorial. I would say [the role of] editor and community organiser / group advisor / that kind of realist [or] pessimist that helps solve problems. I think that's my role.

Rob Watson

And just tell us a bit about how you defined that role. So what was the word again? So just, just remind me, the word that you came up with?

Emma Guy

Previously? So I said, self-defined.

Rob Watson

Right. So what does that mean to you? How would you explain a little bit about that- how did you come to that point?

Emma Guy

I think basically, I've done lots of different roles previously. And I think that, to kind of summarise all of them, I've gone into situations where I sometimes have experience with doing different things, or maybe perhaps don't have the most experience as everyone else in the room and have really worked hard to achieve things.

So naturally, I think that I've defined who I am and my roles within organisations myself. So, I think that's kind of why I chose that word because I think that, what I'm able to do and hopefully other people see that as well, is to come into situations and bring something to the table.

And that's what I've done with the Great Central Gazette and hopefully that's been appreciated. So, I think self-defined is something that resonates with me.

Rob Watson

I hope as part of the conversation, that we draw out more about self-defined for what? What do you bring to the table? I think that's the next stage and we don't have to know that now. That's the journey that we're on – I like that we're on. Megan, what about you?

Megan Lupton

So, I joined the Gazette more recently and obviously [I’m] absolutely thrilled to be working with Rhys and Emma and to be part of a team that I think is so supportive and passionate and just to equally share this common goal to do something really good for Leicester.

And so I'm overseeing more of the communications. So, specifically the social media, the podcast, which is what you're listening to now and the newsletter. I'm a creative at heart, so I always knew that I wanted to do creative writing. As an undergraduate, I did film and creative writing at the University of Essex, and then creative writing as a master's, and now creative writing, again, as a PhD.

It's something I was always really passionate in but something that not a lot of people around me shared that passion for. So, I really had to try and find avenues that I could go down in my career that would lead me to that ultimate goal of doing something that I was really passionate about – which is creative writing.

So, I see the Gazette as a fantastic opportunity for creatives in Leicester, for people in Leicester, who want to pursue a career maybe in investigative journalism, or in writing [this is] an avenue for them to get into it. Because there aren't a lot of opportunities, I think, in Leicester for that sort of thing.

Rob Watson

How would you define creativity? What's your, what's, what is that creative thing?

Megan Lupton

So for me, in terms of my creativity, it's getting that internal monologue that you sometimes have rattling around in your head – where you think there's an idea here or there's a story here and putting it out into the world. That for me is what creating is.

Rob Watson

Rhys?

Rhys Everquill

I’m the mad one! Ever the optimist. Like Emma said, I originally came to her with the idea, primarily because I was sort of dissatisfied with the media in Leicester and more widely as well, on a national scale. As somebody who trained as a journalist and is from a working-class background, I found that the current system of media is very much broken.

And there needed to be a new way of doing things. That sort of manifested itself as the Great Central Gazette.

And like Emma, I trained in investigative journalism and that is something I want the Gazette to focus on. Investigative journalism? There isn't that in the city and there are a lot of issues that need an in-depth look.

I think, personally, I want to create something that's beyond media as well, like the newspapers, you know, it's radical, it's new, it’s independent. But also, more recently, I've been thinking about what kind of workplace we want to foster at the Gazette and how we want to engage and communicate with members and the wider community. I really want people to be involved and to feel welcome and you know, we're going to have an open door policy at the Gazette – so for me, that's what it's all about, really.

Rob Watson

One of the challenges is – I think what you describe in a way is, is completely accurate about our media lacks, any understanding of what it means to belong and what it means to participate within social life, community life, local life – Whether it's place-based, or whether it's identity-based.

How do you think looking from this point of starting in the journey, what do you think your expectations are about how you might foster that belonging and what the role is more widely? The criticisms and the benefits of different types of media, who do you look to, what are the examples that you think about? Who wants to – who wants to jump in with that?

Emma Guy

I can start, so to kind of go back to what we were speaking about before, like when Rhys came to me with the idea, I had been living away – so I came to Leicester when I was 18. I was born and like raised in Luton, which is not that far away. And it has quite a lot of similarities, actually, to here. I would say Leicester is like a bigger – a bigger version of Luton really, with a clock tower!

So, I had been living outside of Leicester during lockdown. So, I kind of returned after lockdown, back to back to where I felt like was home, which was here. And I kind of felt really disconnected, you know, I hadn't been in the community for a space of time and I kind of thought – and I had this conversation with Rhys – I said, I think it's a great idea but what I would want to think about is as someone that's come back and does feel disconnected from the community, how would I want [the Gazette] to be? How would I want to consume things? How would I want to be involved in the community again?

So I think my and my involvement in the Gazette has really been a personal one. To get back out into the communities and talk to people and just feel like a sense of home again. So for me, it's come from quite a personal kind of point of view, to feel connected with others.

And I think part of that has just been actually going out and meeting people and speaking to people and not being shy and not feeling not confident enough to have conversations with people about what's going on in their lives. You know, like, just stood in a queue. I think it started when I moved back and I was just standing in queues at the post office [for example] and asking people how their day was and hearing what they had to say, and actually listening to them.

Rob Watson

In your training and your education about journalism and your interaction with other journalists, does anybody ever talk about feelings?

Emma Guy

No – I mean, that's a really good question. I think the short answer is no. And I think that it's kind of a lot of stuff is void of emotion these days. And I actually think that, you know especially with local reporting, as well – you’re reporting from your home patch, and I think that there's always going to be emotions there and thoughts and opinions.

And I think maybe, I don't know, maybe on sort of a national scale or more of a corporate scale, even, I think maybe the attention is focused on thoughts and opinions and viewpoints, rather than how people feel about things. And I definitely – as someone who is coming into this, I definitely pick up on people's feelings a lot. So, that's something that I tend to kind of get to, I get to the heart of it in the first instance.

Rob Watson

In that context of, if you like, the model is – I'm not saying this is what it will be in the future but it's a useful starting point to think about – if it's a feelings – driven model of thinking about belonging and that feeling of connection. I suppose the question that comes immediately to mind is, how do we distinguish a role for objectivity?

Because you can get wrapped up in something and you can be passionate about it. But is that the role of the, as a journalist or as a reporter, you've kind of sometimes got to step back from that and say, actually, we're looking at this in a more impartial way, we're looking at the evidence and the empirical data. And you have to put aside some of those feelings, but you, you’re human beings.

And Megan, how would you see that process of managing that tension between feeling your way into something and then looking at something and saying, hang on a minute, there's an objective criteria to this...

Megan Lupton

...I think it's really hard because I think we are all shaped by our experiences and shaped by our feelings towards things and it goes without saying the Gazette is going to be an unbiased source of information.

I think it's also important that we are a newspaper that fights for what we believe in, in terms of, potential instances of racism, sexism, homophobia and kind of distinguishing that having unbiased media does not necessarily mean that we can't then call out those instances in the city that we see and we identify it.

I think when we talk about belonging as well, belonging is really individual. And I think every single person has a different definition of what belonging means to them based on their own experiences, which is why I think our model of bringing the community into the Gazette and having, giving them the platform to talk about the issues that are really important to them, I think in turn, creates that feeling of belonging because it allows them to define it themselves.

Rhys Everquill

Yeah, just to pick up on what you just said there, Megan at the end. We can't do this alone. Like you said, we all have individual experiences and part of our model, being a co-operative newspaper means that we can cooperate with others and bring people into the conversation and identify, quite clearly, if something is wrong we'll say it's wrong. While also being quite a, you know, laying out the facts, not making up whatever, in our say, news stories, for instance.

And I think if we weren't a co-operative, if we didn't have this sort of environment of collaboration, that we're trying to foster, an independent media outlet in a city like Leicester that's as big as it is, wouldn't thrive. It might survive, but I don't think it could go particularly far because there will always be a gap in such an organisation that can't be filled by any other means.

Rob Watson

How do we avoid the distrust? People distrust our media and a lot of people distrust journalism - although they use it and they rely on it. There is a distrust there.

Because that distrust is often based on a sense of exploitation that goes with it, you know, we've seen the scandals that led to the closure of the News of the World, that kind of thing. And there's always a sense that social media now, is very exploitative and clickbait and things like that and it becomes a cynical exercise.

What's the approach that you want to develop for the Gazette that kind of clearly delineates between where would you think that you'd be crossing the line about exploiting something and becoming a lazy hack, to use a phrase and maintaining that passion and care and commitment, and that sense of identity and belonging?

Rhys Everquill

Well, I think most people who will be listening to this will be listening to it on the Great Central Gazette Website and you only need to scroll down the page to see that we are regulated by Impress – the independent standards and regulator for journalism and the media.

And following their code of conduct, their standards code is really important for us. If we didn't, you know, we would be that sort of regular old hack who can say whatever they want, but we are governed by a document – a code that has consequences if we break it.

And it doesn't stop there. In our internal day-to-day practices, you know, we'll have policies and workflows that mean that we're not going to stray too far from sort of key values of objectivity and neutrality.

Rob Watson

And you're aiming to bring in a level of transparency with that?

Emma Guy

Yeah, I think that for me, the main thing is, is that, we're doing this in our own time, right? So, naturally we have taken our time with things and handled things with care - not to say that other people don't, but I fully understand and recognise that if you're working nine to five and you have a high workload, things might slip through the net.

So naturally, I think you're right, I think there is a distrust widely between the public and journalists and/or community reporters, etc. I think that could be down to the way that people report things. But it can also be down to how that interview has been carried out.

So for instance, you know, what we do is, I'll jump on the phone with people for an hour and that won't necessarily be the interview. We'll just talk and that will be off the record. And I think that it's about treating people with decency and respect and not using them for a story. That's not the end goal. It's not the end goal for us, we're not looking to put three or four pieces out a day, we're taking our time with this, and we're doing it because we want to do it and because we're passionate about it. Because we want to have a positive contribution to our community.

So I think that naturally, there are things that we put in place to be able to handle things with care and to be able to follow through on processes that mean that people are really taken care of - including ourselves.

Rhys Everquill

And I think as well with things like Impress, like I mentioned as well, that they have a complaints process, but if we're taking our time with the journalism that we're producing, my hope is that it won't get to that, you know, we won’t have people making complaints because we're pursuing a slow, more quality-driven journalism.

But you know, we've got that foundation there that if we do make a mistake, if we do accidentally rush something, then there's safeguards and barriers in place that the local community can recognise as being effective and useful.

Rob Watson

And the perception of that has been that news is fast and is constantly updated. There’s projects I've worked on and I've got friends who thing that somewhere there's a big office with hundreds of people working in it and coming and going, and it's like, no. It's three or four people doing the work in whatever time they can get between their freelance work.

Megan, in terms of the peer groups for the Gazette,  who are the peers that you want to be able to hold your head up and – with, and kind of say, you know, that you're aligned with? That you're inspired by.

Megan Lupton

Yeah, of course. So, obviously, at the Gazette we have our board members who are, you know, including Rob, is a fantastic group of people who can hold us accountable, who we can talk to and get advice from. We will have, obviously, our volunteers and our wider members and with our model, the members will have that direct line of communication to us.  So, there's not going to be a barrier between us and our members.

But I think most importantly for me is that the, as cliche as it sounds, the people of Leicester are also going to be one of our peers, because we are going to work directly with them, we are going to hear from them, hear their stories, hear that issues, hear what they want to, want to read.

I think when we talk about avoiding that sort of clickbait or a fast journalism approach, it's the fact that we're not going to be jumping on these trends and getting out content as quickly as possible. We're going to really focus on these well-researched, long-form articles.This isn't going to be a newspaper that you quickly read a headline while you're scrolling through on your commute, and then flick away and move on to something else, this is gonna be something that you can really sit down with, and really digest and look into something that is important for the people of Leicester.

And so for me, one of our biggest peers, I'm one of the people that I really hope hold us accountable as a newspaper are just that, the people of Leicester.

Rob Watson

Other media organisations, Rhys, that you've got in mind, that would be your, your peer network that you want to assess alongside and, and live up to the, you know, the work that other people have done?

What would- who have you got in mind that you're inspired by?

Rhys Everquill

For sure. So, we're quite plugged in to sort of the independent media networks. We're members of the Independent Media Association, and that association has among its membership 60+, 70+, independent media organisation’s and some of those have been going for decades; they do really great work.

You know, you've got the likes of Open Democracy, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, Byline Times, they're all great publications and we would like to be held up to the same standard that they are.

More locally, we've mentioned before in other interviews that we've based our model off of the Bristol cable, who are also IMA members. They run their newspaper, their local newspaper, out of Bristol on a co-operative model. And we've sat down with them a few times and had plenty of conversations with them about how we can make this work for Leicester. And it’s connections like that in the independent media scene and also more widely, the cooperative movement, that make the Gazette really special, because we have friends all over who can help us with advice, will quite plainly tell us if we're doing something wrong.

And I think that's really important because I want to be pulled up on my mistakes if I make one, so I can improve and you know, we can create something that's better than what's already out there.

Emma Guy

It’s also a great support group and network to have because, I mean, it's great to be pulled up on things that you might potentially be doing wrong, or to ask for advice. But it's also been great to kind of have people say:  “actually, I think that's a really good idea”, and “we didn't do it like that, you should definitely go for it”. That has been a really nice environment for us to be in because this is a learning process.

You know, it's been a year in the making, but that's not to say that when we launch everything is going to be tidy and that we know everything and we're up and running and that we're never going to make a mistake – or that we're never going to learn or progress. I think that this, this whole process is [the Gazette] is really a learning experience for us.

Rob Watson

I've got a couple of last questions. How are you going to make this work for Leicester. That is the key, isn't it? What are you're going to try and discover and how are you going to make this work for Leicester? What do you think the key things are that you maybe need to do which are different from other places? And what is it that you're looking at that would make it work for Leicester?

Rhys Everquill

So, as we all know, Leicester is an incredibly diverse city, politically, ethnically, culturally. And one key practical way we want to sort of foster that is through accessibility.

For instance, on our website, you'll see there's a little icon in the bottom left, that should say “accessibility tools”. If you click on that, open the toolbar, that will allow you to translate that into over 100 languages. In a city like Leicester, you couldn't have that – we can't just be an English-language newspaper. There's so many people out there with stories to tell and we want to listen.

Rob Watson

Megan, what about for you?

Megan Lupton

That was good, wasn't it?

Rhys Everquill

I do well, sometimes!

Megan Lupton

I’m stunned to silence!

Rob Watson

So it's, so it's like harnessing the technology in order to be able to tell stories?

Megan Lupton

Yeah, definitely. I think that's what I'm so excited about in terms of the different platforms that this is going to be on because we've acknowledged that not everyone is, is going to sit down with a cup of tea in the morning and scroll through the Gazette and, you know, digest that weekly, monthly news or whatever, you know?

People may want to listen to it as a podcast, they may want to follow us on social media, and there are so many different avenues that people can keep up to date with the Gazette. And that's what I'm really excited about because we acknowledge that not everyone absorbs news in the same way.

And I think, going back to what Rhys said, it's going to be, kind of, a constant evolution. And the best way for us to serve the people of Leicester is for us to respond to the feedback from the people of Leicester and constantly evolve as a newspaper.

Rob Watson

Emma, what about you? What's that thing that's kept you from going back to Luton and stay in Leicester?

Emma Guy

I do go back, I’ve still got friends and family -

Rob Watson

Not to live there, though? Do you know what you liked when I when I moved here?

Emma Guy

Do you know what, like, when I- when I moved here I just became very comfortable here very quickly. And I think that- not to say that I wasn’t in Luton. I still have, you know, a lot of love for Luton and, but, you know, Leicester is home.

And like, it was funny. I went to see my grandma the other day who lives in Luton still and she was trying to explain where something was. And she was like, “oh, you know, this street?” And I'm like, no, I have no idea where that is. And she was like, “oh, Em you're from here”. And I was like, yeah, but I’m kind of not. I know I was born and raised there but like, thinking about the names of streets and where things are and what buildings used to be and, and all of that [I just don’t know anymore].

It's strange when you move somewhere different and you've been here for a while, how things change. And I could name like most of the streets- it's like, if you asked me, if it was the same conversation, but she was sat in a house in Leicester and she said, I remember this or “you know, it's on Granby Street”, or it's over here, it's on Charles Street, then I would, I would know exactly where it was.

But I had no idea.

Rob Watson

Isn't that a fantastic test for all of our media to say, do you know where - you know, local media particularly - do you know your local area? Do you know where things are? That's one of the things that's disappeared.

Because places, remote work and working in different cities, producing something and faking local media to make it look like it's produced, but just using Apps and Google and all the rest of it to create a sense of, fake sense of local identity. But you need to know what it's like to stand at the Haymarket bus station and wait for a bus…

Emma Guy

Like 6 am in the morning with a £1 cup of coffee that wasn't very good. And we've all done that you know, I've spent a fair amount of time doing that most mornings!

Rob Watson

So, when we have our [director’s] meetings, that's the kind of questions I will be asking, you know, when did you get out of your house?

You know, when you're sitting on the bus, go into the market, waiting at the bus stops - when are you travelling around the city? You know, that's got to be a big part of what we do.

Megan Lupton

I think Leicester isn't necessarily a place, Leicester is the people. And when we talk about the different streets and the different areas of Leicester, we're not talking about it in the same way that Google Maps would. We're talking about the memories and the history of Leicester.

And what I'm really excited about coming from, because I live in a village outside of the city of Leicester, about 10 minute's drive away. And I think what's going to be great about the Gazette, as we continue, and as we develop, we are going to be able to serve Leicester as a city but also some of the close by surrounding regions and tell their stories as well.

So it's, it goes beyond the city. It goes beyond kind of the immediate sort of Google Maps overview of Leicester and goes more towards kind of the history and the people within it.

Rob Watson

So, last two questions. The first one is what you're looking forward to, in getting things started, and where can people get in contact with you?

Rhys Everquill

I guess that’s been directed towards me!

I’m particularly looking forward to two projects that we've got coming up in the Spring. So, we have a series of launch articles now, but what's really exciting is that we have an election around the corner, a local election. And arguably it might be one of the most important local elections in Leicester’s history, at least in the last decade or two.

Not only will all the councillors be up for election, the mayoral role will also be up for election. And there's a lot of sort of ongoing issues in Leicester that can be picked up in that election, recent issues that are going to be touched on as well.

But aside from the election – which will be our litmus test – we have recently received funding from De Montfort University to write a series of articles on sustainability and looking at what a green city in Leicester might look like. Now that should be about a three month project; we will run a series of events alongside those articles and also create media in different formats, like podcast’s like this, and that’s going to be a really exciting project for us because we are going to be working with students to produce that.

And also going out into different neighbourhoods’ in Leicester that aren't typically reported on and getting their two cents about what they want to change in terms of the environment in Leicester. How can we make the city a happier place to live, a healthier place to live, for instance?

And if anybody wants to get involved with either of those projects or the Gazette more generally, we have contact information on our website that you can find at the bottom of the page. Feel free to email us, call us, like I said because we have an open-door policy. We want to hear from you,

Rob Watson

And for someone listening, what are those contact details?

Rhys Everquill

Twitter and instagram: @thegazettecoop. By email at info@greatcentralgazette.org.

Rob Watson

And the website?

Rhys Everquill

greatcentralgazette.org.

Megan Lupton

These will all be in the description as well, so I urge you all to go down to the description and look for the contact details there because I will make sure to include all of the links as well.

Emma Guy

And don’t hesitate to reach out and get in touch. I mean, we have got an open-door policy – don't be shy, come and talk to us!