Eve Holt

Conference poster with two headshots announcing "Power and participation in public tech," featuring Gavin Freeguard and Eve Holt, event hosted by CONNECTED by DATA.

📣 'Power and participation in public tech' conference registration is open!
📆 Friday 6th March
🕰️ 10:00 - 17:00
🏢 Manchester, UK

We're pleased to announce the day includes @gavinfreeguard.bsky.social in conversation with @evefrancisholt.bsky.social from GMCA.

🔗 connectedbydata.org/events/2026...

A photo of me age around 6 holding a frog

Who else is eating frogs for breakfast today?

“Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.” Mark Twain

i.e perform your most difficult task first thing in the morning.

So here goes!
Last push before a week off.

A Feel Good Your Way campaign asset featuring a teenage girl holding a green football with white text: Feel Good Your Way.

Listen. Act. Celebrate. It is vital that we listen to, and act upon, young people’s voices and celebrate the successes. Theirs and ours.

New blog from Andrew Lawton calls for positive messages and momentum around young people moving more to feel good: https://ow.ly/Z5Az50Xqq5S

Three people outdoors engaged in a conversation on a sunny day in a park.

Want to make your sport or activity sessions more inclusive for neurodivergent people?

Join GM Moving and Access Sport for a free online session exploring #Neurodiversity in #CommunitySport. ⛹️‍♀️

1 December, 6:30pm to 7:30pm, Online
Book: https://ow.ly/aLS550XugG5

#InclusiveSport #Autism #ADHD

How do new opportunities link to people on the ground?

On BBC Politics NW this morning, @sarahlonglands.bsky.social explained how the benefits of @andyburnham.bsky.social's Good Growth Fund should enable people feel that their lives are getting better.

🎥 Watch here: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

It's #GoodEmploymentWeek!

Today we publish our analysis with Greater Manchester Good Employment Charter showing that good employment can have a positive impact on:

🌟Productivity
🌟Profitability
🌟Morale
🌟Retention
🌟Reducing sick pay

🔗 cles.org.uk/publications...

Andy Burnham @mayorofgm.bsky.social writes in his essay: “The country is crying out for change. But not just any change. People don’t want more promises from on high... It’s about shifting power – real power – out of Westminster, and into the hands of people who know their communities best."

Collage of 9 photos from my day - from cycle to Manchester Piccadilly to train to Liverpool and day at Labour Party conference

Today in nine photos. Manchester to Liverpool and back again for #LPC25.

We spoke to 42 people in 19 areas getting £20m - this is how they'd spend it The government's new initiative gives £20m over 10 years to 19 areas in Greater Manchester - and voters decide how to spend it

‘What people most want are places they can connect with others.’

And basics like public toilets, benches, more spaces for young people.

This is what we hear all the time. People are longing for welcoming spaces & places for human connection, health and hope.

This is at the heart of #GMLiveWell

Collage of 12 photos of some highlights from my last week

A few highlights from last week:
💃🏻Rambertdance at The Lowry
🏡Speaking @NEA #warmhomes event
💥#PeoplesPowerhouse discussion
🎨 Creativehealth #LiveWell Roundtable
👩‍💼#UrbanistasNW Perimenopause event
🧐Inclusive research network
🚶🏾‍♀️#GMMoving Board meeting
🏆Awards event at British Muslim Heritage Centre

Collage of 9 photos from my week.

Some highlights this week:
💙Talking about GM’s prevention-first approach @TheKingsFund Conf
🚴‍♀️Cycling around London
🎂20th anniversary @transportwm
❤️@VCFSELeadersGM insights & action
💷Planning for GM Guaranteed Living Income & UBI pilots.
📕@sarasiobhan book launch & panel
🌱GM #CyanLines launched

For the next four weeks, we are lifting the 9.30am rule on older and disabled people’s bus passes.

We hope it will help people over the summer as well as provide valuable data on whether we have the capacity and finances to make it permanent.

Please help spread the word! 🙏🏻

Joined-up journeys: achieving and measuring transport integration - Committees - UK Parliament The Transport Committee is looking at how Government can mould transport services, networks and options around the journeys that people need and want to make in their daily lives. We want to find out ...

The Transport Committee has a call for evidence on 'joined-up journeys: achieving and measuring transport integration'.

Spread the word.

Voices of Greater Manchester YouTube video by Greater Manchester Combined Authority

Our new GM Strategy is about people and enabling good lives for all.

The 1st pledge is to ‘put equality goals at the heart of our plans, embedding inclusive practices across all public services.’

This week’s Tackling Inequality Board explored how we make that a reality.

youtu.be/m3Iu3smH2Io

You can catch up on my conversation this week with Andy Jackson, Ben Glover and Saima Ashraf on what it truly means to put power in the hands of people and places, and how policy must shift to support this.

Watch here: m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT_1...

#CommunityPower #DoWith

No Place Like Home.🏡
A safe, decent, healthy home is essential for people to be able to get on in life. That’s why we’ve committed to a #HousingFirst approach in #GreaterManchester.

As @andyburnham.bsky.social says in the foreword, when you set people up to succeed - they largely do.

Collage of 9 photos from Stockroom - showing inside and outside and photo of me holding the new Greater Manchester strategy

Finally made it to Stockroom, #Stockport this week. What a wonderful, warm welcoming centre - for anybody & everybody - as it says on the door.

A perfect space for this week’s VCFSE Forum exploring inclusive local economies & support to enable good lives for all #GMLiveWell. ♥️

Looking forward to this conversation next week.

Wow that was intense but we made it through! Well done #Lionesses

Well of course!! 😉✨

Has been a pleasure to share our learnings in #GreaterManchester to help shape the new national Civil Society Covenant - reshaping how government works with communities to tackle Britain’s biggest challenges.

PM set to reshape how Government works with communities to tackle Britain’s biggest challenges The Prime Minister will launch the Civil Society Covenant – a new way of working that puts people at the heart of government.

"This is about rebalancing power and responsibility. Not the top-down approach of the state working alone. Not the transactional approach of markets left to their own devices. But a new way forward – where government and civil society work side by side to deliver real change"

Blue graphic with a bold light yellow title: "Done To Not With - Localis/We're Right Here policy webinar." Photos of the speakers Andy Jackson, Cllr. Saima Ashraf, Ben Glover and Eve Holt.

How can we move from a rhetoric of localism to active community power?

Join us and @localis.bsky.social for a webinar exploring the enablers and barriers to #CommunityPower in the UK.

🗓️ 22 July
👉 Register: events.teams.microsoft.com/event/dda32e...
@evefrancisholt.bsky.social #DoWith

Landmark Devolution Bill brings new dawn of regional power English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill delivers on manifesto commitment to de-centralise power and ignite regional growth with powers for mayors.

📢 Power to the People!

I haven’t read in full yet but pleased to see that the Devolution Bill will:

🏛️Shift power out of Whitehall
👭Empower local & regional leaders
🏠Create a Community Right to Buy
🗺️Give communities say on planning
❤️Put local assets in local hands
🗳️Increase voting power

River Seine: Waters reopens to swimmers after century-long ban For the first time in more than 100 years people will be able to swim legally in three sections of the river.

"For 100 years swimming was banned in the river because of the levels of water pollution that could make people ill...Ahead of last summer's Olympics more than €1.4bn (£1.2bn; $1.6bn) was invested into cleaning up the Seine."

Collage of my week in 9 photos reflecting what I’ve been up to - see post

Another action-packed week in #GreaterManchester
🚴‍♀️Rode to school with 200+ kids ♿️co-hosted MPs briefing 🌱met Welsh Future Generations team 🗣️spoke at Women’s Health & Community Wealth Summits 🎶enjoyed Sounds of the City & more—active travel, Coops, skills, play, youth voice & Great North.
I ❤️ #TeamGM

Excellent analysis from @rosiebeacon.bsky.social on the 10yr Plan … the really genuinely radical announcement & it’s up & running is Greater Manchester as a Prevention demonstrator .. this is proper neighbourhood health .. vision & leadership from @mayorofgm.bsky.social @evefrancisholt.bsky.social 👏

Photos of CLeS conference swagger - bag, speaker thank you chocolate and Carneagie Life in Uk report. Plus photos of menti word cloud and a couple of speakers

Thank you to the wonderful folk at CLES for convening a brilliant array of changemakers & conversations for today’s #CommunityWealthBuilding Summit 2025.

All united by a vision of fairer, more democratic local economies.

#CWBSummit2025 #LocalEconomies #InclusiveEconomy

Photo of six women speakers at the conference all holding up fans

Spent this morning talking about Women's Health in #GreaterManchester & why we have to address inequalities in wealth & power.

Good to share the work we are doing in GM to apply a gendered lens, close inequality gaps, track the data & lay building blocks for good lives for all.

Great fun at #WomensHealthGM today with @janemcdermott.bsky.social and @evefrancisholt.bsky.social discussing the GMCA's plans for women's health and @healthequitynorth.bsky.social Woman of the North report.