Views of Barking & Tower Hamlets on place and aspiration
Queen Mary commissioned Public First to run focus groups with residents of Tower Hamlets and Barking and Dagenham in order to unpick some of the ways in which East Londoners relate to aspiration and opportunities as they relate to their homes and communities.
We recruited two groups that were broadly reflective of the demographic make up of each area (Barking and Dagenham and Tower Hamlets), taking into account ethnicity, gender, education level and occupation. Research quotas were developed using the latest ONS data. The focus groups were not recruited to be totally “representative” of the area given the small sample size (16 participants total), but were recruited specifically to reflect the make up of areas we were looking into.
The document below constitutes a snap-shot of aspiration, in two specific places, at this moment in the UK’s political and economic cycle, and is designed as a prompt for thought and the start of a longer-term and embedded project on aspiration which will examine views of young people, parents and political leaders.
Section 1 paints a picture of East London through the eyes of its residents, creating a definition of the place through the words of those who know and understand it best.
Section 2 seeks to understand what East Londoners aspire to, and what ambition and opportunity mean to them.
Section 3 discusses what they see as barriers to aspiration in the area.