Health and social care

Wastage, needless bureaucracy and a dangerous addiction to growth means that we’re failing people on healthcare. But, mutinies are happening.

Manchester pirates

Cat Duncan Rees and Naomi Davies are leading the way with their healthcare mutiny in Greater Manchester.

Cat does her own thing, alongside working for Think Local Act Personal, a charity that recognises that a simple truth: people in need of social care support, want to have a life, not a service. People are citizens first and foremost.  Naomi’s on the inside, and daily bringing more people into the crew. You can read more about their mission to ‘re-humanising the system’ here, or find their daily BMP shout outs on Twitter.

Tackling loneliness at source

In 2018 the UK government appointed a Minister for Loneliness, recognising that lack of human connection is a serious factor in mental and physical ill health. Matthew Cook is head of people at creative agency Gravity Road, but he is also on a mission to disrupt loneliness using what he knows about pirate style storytelling.

When it comes to talking to people there is no place more terrifying than the London Underground. But here he is. Follow @abeautifulsomething or get Matthew on

Mental health mutiny

Ian Hurst runs We are Hummingbird. They go into companies and train people to become Mental Health First aiders - recognising that there’s still a lot of work to do in reducing the stigma on mental health. They also use music to help people express themselves and host a thriving community with tons of great playlists.

You can read more about Ian’s story here, but suffice to say he is fully pirate and has used the principle of REORGANISE: Ian and the team use guerrilla marketing and various light touch collaborations to achieve scale.

They’re open to all kinds of collaboration in the mental health space and music industry. Contact Ian here, he’s based on the South Coast.

Sam