Nautia Housing Co-op Talk, Norwich

I went to a talk by some of the founding members of Norwich’s housing Co-op Nautia last week as part of my university’s ‘Reclaim Your Life’ week. Although their main aim was to find new members for the co-op their talk was very useful. They are part of Radical Routes (a secondary co-op made up of lots of other housing co-ops across the UK) and gave an honest account of their experience as part of the scheme. By being part of Radical Routes (http://www.radicalroutes.org.uk/) co-ops receive lots of support in the form of financial aid, help with manual labour from more experienced members and help with the admin involved with running a cooperative. It also seems to be a gateway into a warm and interesting community strengthened by monthly social ‘gatherings’.

Part of being a Radical Routes member is a dedication to promoting social change. This is something which is checked up on: members must prove that they are using their co-op as a tool to support and raise awareness of ‘radical’ issues, and at least help other housing cooperatives with work. In addition each member is drafted in to perform a particular task within Radical Routes such as accounting, administration, organising the gatherings etc. It seems like joining Radical Routes is quite a big undertaking that involves more than simply benefitting from their support and links to financial aid, but one that is certainly worth pursuing.

The members from Nautia (left) explained how they had started with big ideas of getting a huge house for all of their friends but how things had shaken down to just five people and a three-bedroom terrace house. This leads me to wonder what we’ll end up with, is our dream of owning a large abandoned pub with beer garden a little too ambitious...? At this stage I feel that writing off any possibility would be foolish, so we’ll keep looking at those mansions with swimming pools.

I found out this weekend at another housing co-op (will post about that one another time) that Nautia’s unusual name came about because they stuck a pin in a book randomly to find the word ‘naughtier’ (which book was this, we wondered?) and changed the spelling to make it seem more legitimate. We’ll have to start long-listing possible names for our own housing cooperative: definitely a long-term project, and one we have plenty of time for.

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