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Jagtar Singh (National Officer) Duncan White (NDFA Chair) Zahoor Ahmad (AFSA Chair)Jagtar invited me to the conference to take the event photographs, speak about the last 20 years disability advocacy I have been undertaking and also about the benefits of networking. These are subjects close to my heart and I shall be running two masterclasses on Networking at the annual conference of the Society of Wedding and Portrait Photographers in January next year with my hero Zoe Richards. http://www.zoephotography.co.uk/
It's not uncommon to hear people at conferences saying the sort of things that the delegates want to hear and then not follow them up. Empty rhetoric exposes the lack of integrity of so many people who are (as my parents would say) old enough to know better. On this occasion however, there was a tangible passion in the words I heard from many of the people there and it left me feeling hopeful that it was really going to make a difference to the people who had attended.
On the first evening entertainment, dancing and great food added to the networking opportunities. During the evening £2500 was raised for three different charities:
MacMillan Breast Cancer Awareness, http://www.macmillan.org.uk/Cancerinformation/Cancertypes/Breastfemale/Breastcancer.aspx
Water Wells in India http://thewaterproject.org/wells_for_india.asp
Indonesian Eathquake Appeal. http://www.baitulmaal.org/us/asia/37-asia-projects-/154-indonesia-earthquake-appeal-2009
Zahoor Ahmad, Chair of AFSA, said “I am so proud today to see that all our efforts to bring the Association onto the national stage recognised, and to see the efforts of the founder members rewarded by the commitments from Chief Fire Officers, Government Officers, Equality and Diversity officers, Sponsors and, of course, our members acknowledged in such a positive way. As someone said today, if we could bottle the energy and commitment in the room we would become millionaires very quickly.”
Jaggit Kaur Hayer
I was ably assisted in the 2 day shooting by Marta Demartini from HM Digiart http://www.hmdigiart.com/ and Jagtar's sister Jaggit, heself an active member of the AFSA who assisted with the NWFS conference 3 day shoot earlier this year.
AFSA is a consultative body, which consists of serving and retired members from various Fire and Rescue Services within the UK, who aim to assist, support and enhance the work being undertaken in Fire and Rescue Services, both nationally and locally, in achieving their equality and diversity commitments, ranging from recruitment and retention, and positive action to community safety and religious and cultural awareness.
The main keynote speaker was the Fire Minister Shahid Malik. Like any MP who talks at events like these, he'd arrived with a speech drafted by advisors. I've been to so many conferences where the government representative merely reads out sound bites and claptrap avoiding any probing questions and then consuming a free lunch. I was therefore heartened at the AFSA conference when the minister deviated from his prepared script and without prompts or an autocue, delivered something stright from the hip - or was it the heart?
Graham OgilvieGraham Ogilvie spent the two days creating snapshot cartoons from the text of the speeches and the dialogue generated in workshops. Not only was his artwork incredibly thought provoking, but he worked at a speed that qualifies as mass production. His artwork was displayed around the conference and delegates were asked to indicate which ones resonated with them as the two day event progressed. On the final session, people were then asked to add their own observations on the cartoon whose message covered the most important issue for them.
