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An ambitious move to launch the UK’s first co-operatively managed rail service in the South West has moved a step closer.

Bristol-based Go-op has handed in a formal application to run new rail services in Somerset and Wiltshire following planning over the past 12 years.

Go-Op has applied to the Office of Rail and Road to run services between Taunton and Westbury, starting in autumn 2023.

This will see ten departures a day, improving the service levels in growing market towns such as Frome and Melksham.

“Glass Arrow doesn’t have a lot of assets; it’s mostly just a brand,” he explains. “My goal is, by the end of 2023, by working with a couple nonprofits that specialize in empowering workers, to create an employee cooperative and turn over the ownership of Glass Arrow to that cooperative."

Our small towns are seeing big changes. Lots of business owners are retiring, older people are looking for new accommodations, and young people are seeking opportunities away from big cities. Your community has an opportunity to attract new people that will contribute to local economic growth. But people need access to infrastructure and services that many small towns don’t have.  

Thu, January 12, 2023. 1:30 PM – 3:00 PM PST

Short introductory workshops showcasing the myriad of benefits for forming cooperative organizations within the farming sector. The first workshop will be available to all via Zoom and will be followed by several regional workshops for those that wish for a more personal introduction to the benefits of cooperative formation.

Cecosesola of Venezuela receives the Right Livelihood Award “for establishing an equitable and cooperative economic model as a robust alternative to profit-driven economies.”

Founded by Ela R. Bhatt, a lawyer from Ahmedabad, Gujarat (who passed away on 2 November 2022, aged 89), SEWA grew out of the women’s wing of the country’s oldest and largest textile workers’ union in the early 1970s. Initially, government officials refused to register SEWA as a trade union since its intended members did not meet the then legal definition of workers due to their self-employed status.

“South Mountain is a new company. It’s not the company I birthed and built by the seat of my worn and faded Levis; it’s the company new leadership is guiding to uncharted terrain, using tools, methods, and information barely imaginable a decade or two ago,” Abrams wrote. “This I know: Due to the people in place and the nature of the work ahead, I leave with the company in its best condition ever. After 50 years, that’s as clear to me as a full moon in a cloudless sky.

Sitting around a large conference table at an Elevated Title office in South Denver, Ellie Adelman and Jaser Alsharhan are ready to finalize their purchase of a house. It’s the first time either has bought property, and they’re visibly excited, each poised with a pen to begin signing documents.

How do you scale a co-operative? This was the challenge facing Namasté Solar, a workers co-operative based in Boulder USA. Set up by first time entrepreneurs in 2005 it aimed to provide innovative solar electric to Colorado and to distribute the benefits of its success to future employees. But when the cooperative needed finance to grow it looked as though it would have to compromise those ideals.

In this episode, two co-op researchers tell us about their work looking at people’s loyalty to co-operatives. Danika Dinko is the Executive Director of the Saskatchewan Co-operative Association who wrote a thesis exploring the opinions of consumers in regards to shopping at co-ops versus Investor-owned firms. Stan Yu is the Research and Communications Coordinator for the Canadian Centre for the Study of Co-operatives, who looked at whether the employees of co-operatives tend to be loyal co-op customers.