On the Couch with CP Robinson

In this episode of On the Couch with Biscoes, Alison sits down with CP Robinson, Chair of Portsmouth Pride, to discuss how the organisation is evolving into a year‑round, sustainable charity supporting the LGBTQ+ community across Portsmouth.

CP shares the story behind hosting UK Pride, delivering 52 events over 26 weeks, and engaging over 20,000 people, while keeping the majority of activities free and accessible. The conversation explores why Pride is about more than just a single event, highlighting the ongoing work taking place with local organisations, the NHS, and community groups.

They also dive into the value of meaningful business partnerships, showing how companies can go beyond sponsorship to build authentic, inclusive practices that support their teams and communities. From lived‑experience workshops to tailored collaborations, CP explains how organisations can embed inclusivity into their culture.

The episode also uncovers the often unseen work behind Portsmouth Pride, including mentorship programmes, volunteer development, and community initiatives that create long‑term social impact.

A must‑listen for businesses, community leaders, and anyone interested in inclusion, social impact, and making a difference in Portsmouth and beyond.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Biscoes, Biscoes, Biscoes are always everybody.

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Bisco's great service. Every client, every time. Welcome to On the Couch with Bisco's, your home for honest, unscripted business and community chats brought to you by Bisco's solicitors. We work with all kinds of businesses and organisations for our local community, and we've learned so much from the people behind them. So now we want you to hear from them too, to understand the values, lessons, and experiences that kept them moving. If you're looking for hard-hitting legal content, this isn't the podcast for you. This is a cosy, comfortable space for local people and our best collaborators to have a voice. So grab a cupper and come and join us on the couch. Hi, I'm Alison from Biscoes, and joining me on the Biscoes Couch today is CP Robinson.

SPEAKER_02 0:57

Thank you very much for having me on the Biscoes Couch.

SPEAKER_00 1:00

Biscoes Couch, aka Sparks Couch. Right, so CP, we've invited you in because of your involvement with Portsmouth Pride. So tell us what you because there's been a bit of a change around in um leadership and in the board and what have you. So what's your role there now?

SPEAKER_02 1:16

So I'm chair of the board, um, and that's it, technically. Um that's not going to happen. I know. Well, with any any organization that's completely voluntary run, everybody ends up doing a thousand and one things.

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:29

Um, but as much as possible, actually, we've been going through a process the last year to do some relatively, I think what sounds boring to other people, we've been changing our governance and some of our structures and basically making sure that over the next three to five years we move to a model that is infinitely sustainable by the people, the money, all of the work that we're doing. We're trying to kind of change how we operate from the version of pride that people knew for the last seven, eight, nine, ten years, which was a grassroots community movement with a a festival style event that was a celebration of that work into actually a um maintained year-round influential change-making charity. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:16

And and um it was it was quite a significant year for Portsmouth Pride last year because yeah, we were hosts of UK Pride.

SPEAKER_02 2:22

So we won that title in 2023. Yeah. And then um, that was part of our post-COVID recovery plan. So we decided in 2022, I think, that we were bidding as we came out of COVID, and that was what was going to help us kind of get out of COVID and and strengthen ourselves. So that was yeah, 52 events delivered over a 26-week programme that engaged 20,000 people, 83% of those completely free.

SPEAKER_00 2:47

Yeah, and then you went to sleep for a month after that.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

Well, then I had a day job alongside all of that.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

Um, but yeah, and and I think that that's what people perhaps are not aware of is that um Pride isn't just about that one day where we we all gather down in Portsmouth and um and celebrate the community and and it's immense diversity. Um, but there are lots of events that go on um throughout the year. So Biscoes um have been a sponsor now for and involved with Portsmouth Pride for for many, many years. Um and the part of the reason we do that is is um we want to promote uh inclusivity in our business and for our clients to be aware that we are an inclusive um business, that we we welcome anybody as a client. Um and um for us it's a it's a way of demonstrating that as well as being supportive to to a large section of our community. Yeah. Um so why would people get involved if um you know as a sponsor? Is that is that kind of where most sponsors sit?

SPEAKER_02 3:51

It really, really um varies to be honest. And this is how I got involved in Portsmouth Pride right at the start of my journey, which was coming out of COVID. We were still kind of in various bits of lockdowns. Um my background is corporate partnerships for charities, so I make connections between businesses and charities. That's always what I've done. Um, and then kind of moved through charities, not-for-profit, social value organizations. Um, companies get involved with charities' work for a huge range of reasons. So for some, it's about marketing and access to audiences, for some, it's about value alignment, for some, it's a personal interest of the director or the owners of the company, or it's voted on by the members of staff. There's so many different reasons for companies to get involved. Um, it's something that we take really seriously at Portsmouth Pride because companies trust us with their money. Let's be real, you know, the the work that we do costs a lot of money to put on, and we rely quite heavily on the partners, um, our businesses across the city to support us and make that happen. So we take that money really seriously, means we take the relationship really seriously, and we don't just say sponsor Portsmouth Pride and in return you get logos in X, Y, and Z. It's not about that, it's how do we entwin our work? How do we entwin the Portsmouth Pride community, the LGBTQ plus community of Portsmouth that we represent, and the work of any of our partner businesses? So Bisco's is actually a great example because Bisco's have been involved in Portsmouth Pride since way pre uh predating me getting involved. But I knew then when friends of mine were looking for legal support with their gender recognition certificate, Bisco's instantly is the thought of going to because you partner with Pride and it's not just a transactional tokenistic thing, it's embedded through your entire business, through your structure, through your ethics and your ethos. Meaning that somebody coming and asking uh legal professionals about gender recognition certificates, you've got teams that not only know the legal side of that, but understand the person and the language and the sensitivities around that, versus people going, oh my god, who do I go and talk to about this? I I don't know solicitors, that's really scary. That's a um, you know, the big corporate thing. Same when I was going through a divorce, Bisco supported me. Friends of mine that uh buying houses at the moment are doing their conveyancing through Bisco's because they've got unique um family structures and not traditional, you know, they're not married, but there's you know extra complexities around queer relationships that Bisco's understands.

SPEAKER_00 6:26

Yeah, yeah, and then and that's exactly what I'm saying when we you know we want to embed that as a as an understanding.

SPEAKER_02 6:32

It's not that we want to turn our logo rainbow once a year, it's so we want to embed it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:36

Um and and one of one of the experts we've done, which um the um uh Tally, who is was part of the committee, I think she's she's also having a rest um this year, um, came into Visco's and um did a presentation for our staff in LGPTQ um history month, um, just to to um basically just talk around um the issues being faced by that community, um, but but also for people to ask questions because um uh you and I were just having this conversation. Um sometimes people feel a little bit nervous about having those conversations. If it's not a community that touches their lives in any way, um am I using the right pronoun? Am I saying that am I using the right language? All of those things become um a reason for them to kind of back off a little bit. So we like to ensure that we've given that opportunity for our our members of staff to um have that uh open forum for discussion. Um, and that's something I think Portsmouth Pride are really happy to support with sponsors. So it's about as you say, it's just about you know, if they want to embed it as a as a uh an aspect of their business rather than it just being supporting the day, turning the turning the logo rainbow in that particular month. Um, that there are other things that Portsmouth Pride are happy to support with.

SPEAKER_02 7:57

This is it, it's we don't come in and deliver training, you know. If companies out there, there are so many great people out there will deliver the formal training, the accredited CPD is all out there, and we know some great people if when we've got people coming to us and asking for that kind of support, we know some great people that we can signpost to. But what we do is support the organizations that partner with us with lived experience and our experience as people. That's all we can do when we come in and talk to people. We can what we kind of call a lived experience workshop. It doesn't take that name all the time, but that is what it is. It's somebody like Tally or myself or one of the other board members coming in and as part of the partnership just working with the organization on well, what are the challenges that you're seeing that we can support with? If that's brand exposure to the LGBTQ plus community, then that's something we support with as a partnership. If it's actually we don't have enough opportunities internally to have these open conversations about language within equality work or the LGBT community specifically, and I think that would really help the staff, then that's what we support with. That's where we run on a partnership model and not on a sponsorship model. Yeah, it's not a defined list of packages that you can buy, and that includes X Matter this and X Matter that, and one of these and two of that, because you're all completely unique as businesses, and what Bisco's needs this year is different to what Victoria's needs this year is different to what Hampshire Boulevard needs this year, but they're all partners, and we go in and have those conversations of what is it that we can support with, what are the aims, what are you trying to get out of here?

SPEAKER_00 9:30

Yeah, so those those um sponsors can then tailor that partnership package for what it is they're looking to get out of um providing the money. Um so outside of the the main event, let's call it the main event, and it was always absolutely spectacular. I've come along for for many a year, um uh what else happens in in the course of the year?

SPEAKER_02 9:51

Some of it I um I describe as kind of like unsexy work, but it's really important work. So um, as part of those 52 events projects programmes that we delivered as part of the UK Pride Year, we're working now on what of those becomes part of our business as usual year-round programme.

SPEAKER_00 10:10

Because last year was a little bit unusual, wasn't it?

SPEAKER_02 10:12

Yeah, yeah. We threw a lot of we and lots of other people threw a lot of money, time, energy at at UK Pride just to make sure that everybody across the city had an opportunity to engage in in the work of UK Pride.

SPEAKER_00 10:23

And and just to say that uh unlike a lot of um cities who've hosted UK Pride, it remained that very grassroots, free to attend, open, you know, it's on the common, the people can come and go, it's not fenced in or anything like that, not no ticket prices. So that's been a really significant thing for Portsmouth Pride to is to keep it so that people can make it, you know, it can be really accessible.

SPEAKER_02 10:46

That's it. Free and unfenced is kind of it sits so deeply within our constitution that we would have to dissolve as a charity and set up a new charity if we wanted to do a paid-for, fenced off, ticketed main day event. Um, but the year-round stuff also follows that same um same set of values. We want it to be as accessible as possible for people, we want it, and that means you know, financially and transport and the type of activity, everything else. Some of that is year-round community programmes, like we're supporting a LGBTQ plus book club at the moment, and that was through our piloting. So we've we funded that work and now it's off existing in the community. And um, we've got events coming up at the King's Theatre later on in the year that are um supporting 10 performers that we've had on a mentorship programme for the last year in collaboration with Portsmouth Creates. So that's LGBTQ plus people in performing arts that want to develop. We've paired them with mentors, given them bursaries, and the opportunity to perform. Programs like that I think are really sexy, they're really lovely to see happening, they're really showy. They've got something that goes on social media and the people can see. There's so much other work going on in the background, like our work with the NHS on the local plan, on the NHS Plan for Research, on um safer and connected communities that we're doing with Portsmouth City Council and working with transport providers in the university. We're doing projects on access to healthcare with GP surgeries. There's so much other work that goes on that you can't really put it on social media because it's just a photo of 10 people sat around a board table, but it's really important work to be doing. Um, and there's so much of that going on, and that's I think the stuff that people don't see, but it's something that we produced our very first impact report earlier this year for UK Pride so that we could actually put everything together because until you see that.

SPEAKER_00 12:39

And I think I think certainly from a uh business owner's point of view, you know, when we're we're looking for things that we might put money in towards sponsorship, um, meeting some of those ESG uh CRS goals and knowing that it's not just about a big festival on a on the common once once a year, yeah. That actually the grassroots work that Portsmouth Prize is doing does feed into all of that. So sponsors can can be assured that their money is being well used. Um so I think that's really important to say.

SPEAKER_02 13:08

And even that main day, um, and which we call the main day event as well, it's our flagship event, that could only exist because it's a celebration of the year-round work. But even just in that main day, the people that we're having volunteer, and we clocked up about three and a half thousand hours of volunteer time last year in 2025, the main day event is a large portion of that. That's volunteers that are getting opportunities to train in new skills and shadow professionals. So we're training up stage managers and sound lighting technicians and events managers and production people that maybe volunteer with us for two or three years because they're building that experience to go off and do something in the world of work.

SPEAKER_01 13:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:47

So there's other programs that exist alongside it's not just people volunteering going, cool, boom, done. Thanks very much. I've enjoyed that. They're volunteering as part of a skills development plan, which is also something that we're running.

SPEAKER_00 13:59

Yeah, brilliant. Great. Um, and you yourself, you've got a bit of a change coming up this year, haven't you?

SPEAKER_02 14:05

I do indeed, yeah. I start a new job. New job. Yeah, very soon.

SPEAKER_00 14:09

So tell us a little bit about that.

SPEAKER_02 14:10

Yeah, so I've um, like I said, I'm a charities and not-for-profits um lifelong career person. I've been I've never worked for a profit-making organisation I've been in um not-for-profits forever. Um, but uh I have most recently been head of development at Portsmouth Cathedral, so leading their fundraising and development team, and I'm now moving on to be chief operating officer at Shaping Portsmouth. Yay!

SPEAKER_00 14:34

Really excited about that. Um I'll sit as a as a um non-exec direct at um at uh the CIC that is shaping Portsmouth. So we're really excited about having you having you join. And um again, the impact that um Shaping Portsmouth is having in Portsmouth across across education, community, business is is phenomenal. And I I think that that's it's gonna it's gonna see much brighter days as well with you you heading up um operations there. So hopefully. Looking forward to working with you.

SPEAKER_02 15:03

It's an organization that ultimately takes the money that it has access to, whether that's from the local authority or from the 80 or so businesses that it represents, and delivers good projects for Portsmouth.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:14

That's what I've done through all of the charities that I've worked for or been lucky enough to volunteer for in Portsmouth. So it's an opportunity to do that on a on a much bigger scale.

SPEAKER_00 15:22

Indeed. Right. Well, it's lovely to speak to you, CP. Thank you so much for coming and having a chat with us. It's been really great.