6.30pm Saturday 19th October at The Guildhall with DPM Nick Clegg and Cherie Blair

Download the Annual Fundraising Banquet brochure, auction details, and order of events HERE.

Say “widow” to most people, and more likely than not they think of a dark figure with superhuman magical powers surrounded by some mystery. We hear the White Widow was behind the Kenya  shopping mall massacre. The Black Widow conjures up images of a deadly spider, or a Marvel heroine, or a solitary beautiful cloaked woman selling us life insurance.  If only all widows were so empowered.

In reality there are 245 million widows in the world most of whom suffer in silence. They are a hidden and forgotten community that look after 500 million children – usually with extreme prejudice.  The world has turned their back on them, they are neglected, and they have few champions. Unlike the Scottish Widows advert, widowers are not a sexy subject, attract no media attention and given the size of the discrimination it is shocking to see the neglect they live through. Nor is it merely a problem in an emerging countries. There are plenty of British widows who lost their wealth, their homes, their jobs and their standing in the community whilst suffering the loss of their husband.

There is a lone voice headed up by Lord Loomba, who has made it his life mission to redress the imbalance. The Loomba Foundation, in memory of his own mother, now attracts ministers and celebrities, heads of state, leading academics and corporates. This Saturday 19th October 2013, together with their President Cherie Blair QC, and patron Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, they will be gathered at The Guildhall to celebrate 15 years of The Foundation and announce a radical new approach for the cause – The Widows Marketplace.

The size of the problem demands a radical approach. Charities like The Loomba Foundation are faced with decreasing funding as the begging bowl approach hit the pain barrier in a depressed society with little surplus funds. In the brave new world of social innovation and impact investment, the emphasis is on financial bets on a social outcome. Governments talk about new fangled instruments, social investment bonds, payment by results, right to request, social enterprises, mutuals … the list is endless. Unsurprisingly, widows do not fit into this world very  easily. No one is interested in a financial bet on a widow who can’t even feed herself.

So Loomba has decided to turn the challenge on its head to attract the financiers and corporates – a social bet with a financial outcome. Businesses now need to land bank their social metric – it’s become the currency of choice. Out is Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and Sustainability, and in comes in the creation of social value to articulate the goodness in your company. An additional bonus, if the corporate wants to tender for public sector contracts, the Social Value Bill 2013 demands they demonstrate their social impact if they have any hope of winning the tender process. By measuring the social impact of a widow, Loomba can demonstrate that ‘investment’ into his Foundation will multiply ten fold the output of their CSR investments, benchmarking corporates favourably against their competitors.  An entrepreneurial idea fitting of Loomba’s Patron-in-Chief, Sir Richard Branson.

The Loomba Foundation has recruited the Centre for Citizenship, Enterprise and Governance (CCEG) to measure the social impact of insurance companies and widow makers; those aligned to his widow marketplace. He aims to rally them to his cause initially focussing on markets of India, Brazil and South Africa so together they can resolve some intractable problem facing widows worldwide. A very modern solution to an age old social problem.

Visit:

The Loomba Foundation at www.theloombafoundation.org

The Centre for Citizenship, Enterprise and Governance at www.cceg.org.uk

Social impact metric of corporates at www.brandanomics.com

Available for release: Speeches from PM David Cameron, DPM Nick Clegg, Cherie Blair QC and Lord Loomba

Press Contact:

Professor Olinga Ta’eed

olinga.taeed@cceg.org.uk 

Mob: +44 (0) 7798 602987