News

We are looking for Safer Spaces Person(s) for Friday and Saturday and occasionally Thursday nights 10pm-4/5am. Please click below for a full job description.

Security person job spec

Wharf Chambers, like many DIY and cooperative spaces in the UK, is predominantly run and organised by white people. Wharf Chambers Workers’ Co-op and Club Collective do not want, and have never wanted, that. As organisational bodies we reproduce aspects of systematic racism often in our day to day practice. We are committed to trying to identify and lessen that and to try to be a supportive, caring, empowering and listening environment for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic (BAME) people. We recognise that this will always be a process of improvement, but we hope eventually to have a space and set of resources that is partly for, led and steered by BAME people with white members supporting and enabling that work.

In December 2015 Wharf Chambers requested an external facilitator to lead a meeting about racism and white privilege within the Club as well as the wider DIY scene in Leeds. We intended for the meeting to be a space within which people could share ideas and experiences, and for this to help steer our own internal anti-racism strategy. We learnt a lot about our failings in that meeting and we learnt them because BAME people had to point them out to us. It isn’t fair that BAME people have to teach us these things and remind us of things before changes take place. This has taken place since our recent statement too and while we are grateful for the generosity of posters/ contributors we do not want to rely on this going forward and are committed to proactive anti-racist work.

From this meeting Wharf Chambers developed an action plan which reflected the thoughts and feelings of some of our BAME members with short-term, medium-term and long-term actions. However, we were not communicative nor proactive enough about the findings of the meeting, and in the end some BAME people who contributed to the meeting ended up emotionally exhausted. We realise that our communication on this and the recent disclosure of abuse by a staff member have been inadequate. We are committed to continuing anti-racist work and communicating more clearly about what we intend to do and what we are able to do. We have updated the table created after the 2015 meeting with a point-by-point, honest breakdown of what we have and haven’t done, and what we intend to do moving forward (see attached). This, like our safer spaces agreement, is meant to be a live document that evolves over time in response to member input. If you want to suggest anything please email members[at]wharfchambers.org.

We have been a reactive space, without foreseeing potential issues or how we might address members’ needs effectively. Our lack of defined boundaries has meant that we are not able to clearly state what we are able and not able to do. We have a responsibility to respond to any disclosure of abuse with both professionalism and compassion and we are working towards ensuring that we achieve that by developing a robust set of policies and processes that reflect our values. We want to reassure members that despite not always honouring this responsibility in the past, we will listen when issues are brought to us, even when they are about us, and we will take a proactive role in seeking resolution.

We are committed to making disclosures and complaints safer and easier for everyone, recognising that power structures make these harder for some people. Wharf Chambers is committed to responding appropriately to disclosures of abuse in relation to our staff and volunteers. We will also work to ensure that abuse which occurs between members or their guests on our premises is dealt with in line with our safer spaces agreement. Wharf Chambers cannot get involved responding to abuse that occurs between members outside of the premises, however we are committed to listening to our members when they express concerns around their safety, and we will always work proactively to help our members to feel safe when accessing our premises.

We are committed to working hard on our own responsibilities and failings, however we are also conscious that we do not exist in a vacuum. We’re aware that other spaces in Leeds have done their own work and we invite them to participate in a broader conversation to bring about change.

We would also like to draw attention to this document about accountability, produced by DIY Space for London. Although not all points are applicable exactly to us, we think this is an excellent document; one which reflects the need for compassionate, nuanced thinking around disclosures of abuse from survivors.

We have a lot to learn and are committed to educating ourselves. At our next members meeting all of this is up for discussion. We are also planning a members’ survey to inform our work. We will update members on this work at members’ meetings, on the website and on social media.

Thanks for reading,

WCCC

Wharf Chambers is committed to working to improve our space and people’s experiences in it. There are two layers at Wharf Chambers who work together to run the space:

• A co-op of paid staff who – staff the bar, order stock, clean, keep accounts, keep us safe and legal and do all the other things you need to do to run a business.
• A small group of volunteers, the club collective (all members of the club), also work with the co-op to support them in their role of running Wharf, providing advice on staying safe and legal and listening to members about what they want from the space

Wharf Chambers comes from a long history of DIY organising in LS6 and beyond, and when we first started we ran off the good will of many staff and volunteers who made it happen through putting in loads of their time and energy for free. We are proud of the fact we can now offer sustainable employment to a number of people in the co-op, however as a developing business there are limits to our capacity. We recognise that the pace of change can sometimes feel slow but we’re all working hard behind the scenes to keep afloat whilst making improvements.

Together over the last year we have been working to process feedback received and make progress toward Wharf Chambers being a better space for its membership. Through this we have undertaken a development day with staff and club collective to work through feedback received and put in place actions to improve the space. Here is a snapshot of what we’ve been up to:

• We’ve redeveloped the website this year and added loads more information about the space and the club and how to use it – have a read and if you have any questions either email us or speak to the bar staff
• We’ve developed a set of values that we believe inform the way we run the space
• We’ve reviewed and updated our safer spaces agreement
• We’re working on our processes to ensure everything is in place for Wharf to flourish in the future, including reviewing our policies and business planning for the future
• We are working on our processes to involve members including making a members’ handbook, setting up a plan for how we communicate with members and reviewing our members’ meetings
• We’re looking at our own skills and knowledge as a team and working to improve these through skill shares and workshops that we hope to extend to members too in the future

In terms of what happens at Wharf, it’s your club, you do the programming – you just need to be a member of the space and to adhere to its values and safer spaces agreement in order to book. We encourage bookings from any members and are committed to doing our best to help new promoters get involved – see our new promoters’ guide on our website or get in touch via bookings[at]wharfchambers.org

You can find out more about wharf on our website, through emailing us at members[at]wharfchambers.org, following us on twitter, Instagram or facebook and through attending a members’ meeting.

Watch out for our annual members’ survey which should land in your email inbox in the next month and more regular updates to follow through email and this blog.

Thanks for your ongoing support of the space and we look forward to seeing you all soon.

Ellie, Co-Chair of Wharf Chambers Club Collective

Wharf Chambers Cooperative Club recently held their annual AGM. Please click on the link below to download the minutes in full.

Wharf Chambers AGM Minutes 2016

… we’re still ironing out some glitches and working through some teething problems but we’re hoping to have everything fully up and running very very soon!