A FREE event hopes to inspire and entertain by featuring seven Barry people who will help mark the launch of the Barry IdeasBank.

Seven people will speak for seven minutes in the Glamorgan Suite in the Memo Arts Centre, Barry, at 6.30pm on Monday, October 20.

Each has taken action to either protect their community or make Barry a better place to live and work.

Speakers include David Cole talking about the efforts of Barry Town United football supporters, who rallied the local community and the wider football family to take on the might of the Welsh Football Association to keep the club alive, Elwyn Toozer who campaign to save the Cardiff Bus 98 service from ending, Penni Carr who devises creative ways to make it fun for babies and children to learn Welsh, Friends of Barry Beaches who organise monthly clean-ups of Barry’s beaches, Kate Long of the Memo Arts Centre who is working to create a new state-of-the-art cinema for Barry, Stonehouse Mugalaval who enables Barry people to help an orphanage in his Kenyan homeland and Gareth Sweeney who has helped create a Vale radio station.

Barry Island resident Andy Green, of the Flexible Thinking Forum, said: “Our seven speakers all have great personal stories to share to create an entertaining and inspiring evening.

“There are many good people doing good things for our community. We are working through the Barry IdeasBank to inspire and connect like-minded people, to create an even more powerful community working to create a better future for itself.”

The event is hosted and organised by the Barry IdeaBank, run by the Flexible Thinking Forum, a not-for-profit social enterprise.

The Barry IdeasBank, believed to be the UK’s first, provides an independent community platform at where anyone can submit ideas, add to, or vote on other people’s suggestions for making Barry even better.

Organisers hope the Barry IdeasBank will become a world-class example of what is called ‘crowdsourcing’ and ‘open source innovation’ for local communities.

The Barry IdeasBank has support from the Royal Society for Arts, Manufactures & Commerce (RSA) the Vale and Barry town councils, community group Pride in Barry, and leading software and crowdsourcing specialist Crowdicity.

The project will be formally re-launched at the first of its Barry Kultura events at the Memo Arts Centre, Barry, on October 20.

For details, visit www.yourideasbank.org.uk