Spotlight on Leicester – Communities Together Festival 2025

The Spotlight on Leicester programme at the Communities Together Festival 2025 highlighted the role of community radio in fostering civic dialogue, creativity, and shared identity. The discussion raised wider questions about how grassroots media can address the UK’s pressing challenges: declining social cohesion, economic stagnation, antagonistic mainstream outlets, and the reduction of BBC local services. Can community media be sustained as essential civic infrastructure for democratic life and cultural exchange?

The latest edition of the Spotlight on Leicester programme on Soar Sound captured the voices and experiences of those involved in the Leicester Communities Together Festival, held on 13 September 2025. The discussion ranged across the aims of the festival, the practicalities of organising such a wide-ranging event, and the opportunities it creates for residents and visitors to come together in a spirit of openness and shared curiosity.

With the help of John Coster of the Documentary Media Centre, and Helen Pettman of the Evington Echo, contributors spoke about the value of civic gatherings where local groups, cultural organisations, and voluntary services can connect directly with the public. The festival was described as a meeting point for heritage, arts, social services, and community wellbeing initiatives. It provided a platform not only to celebrate Leicester’s diversity, but also to explore how people can work together to address common challenges, from social cohesion to cultural understanding.

The role of community radio was central to this conversation. Broadcasting from the event meant that the experience reached beyond Jubilee Square and into people’s homes, workplaces, and phones. As participants explained, community radio does more than report: it fosters communitas, the shared sense of identity and solidarity that emerges when people participate together. By airing interviews, debates, and spontaneous reflections, the programmes offered a civic forum where voices that might otherwise go unheard could take part in the dialogue about Leicester’s future.

What came through strongly is the creative potential of radio itself. It is not just a medium for relaying information, but a form of artistic and cultural engagement. Listeners are invited on a journey that is enriching and imaginative, whether through the stories collected from festival goers, or the soundscapes that capture the atmosphere of the day. In this way, radio becomes more than a channel for communication—it is a means of exploring and deepening our sense of belonging, while strengthening the civic fabric that holds communities together.

Yet, these conversations also prompt wider questions. At a time when many people feel disconnected from their neighbours and institutions, how can community media play a role in rebuilding trust and social cohesion? In the context of economic stagnation and limited opportunities for younger generations, can locally led media provide spaces where people feel their experiences and aspirations matter? When mainstream media often thrives on antagonism, division, and spectacle, how do we ensure there are platforms for dialogue that nurture reflection, respect, and understanding?

The decline of BBC local services raises further concerns. If one of the UK’s major public institutions is retreating from its responsibility to provide accessible, community-rooted information, what alternatives are in place? How can small, volunteer-led community radio stations be supported to fill this gap in ways that are sustainable and effective? What role should local authorities, educational institutions, or philanthropic organisations play in ensuring that community media is not left to struggle alone? And crucially, how do we recognise community radio not as a marginal hobby, but as an essential civic infrastructure for democratic life?

The Leicester Communities Together Festival demonstrated how community media can give life to local democracy and cultural exchange. Spotlight on Leicester showed that when we use radio to share information, invite debate, and encourage creativity, we create the conditions for a more inclusive, resilient, and engaged society. The question now is whether the UK has the vision to invest in and sustain this grassroots capacity, so that festivals, neighbourhoods, and communities everywhere can benefit from media that is truly of and for the people.