For a week before Easter, I observed at close quarters the passion and commitment that goes into community organisations and social enterprises. I watched ordinary people express ideas for projects to make their estates and neighbourhoods better, and start turning them into business plans. Anyone who’s serious about community empowerment needs to start somewhere like this: a place that brings together people with the seeds of a vision, and others who know how the system works and can show how to open the necessary doors. Julian Dobson, editorial director, New Start Online magazine