Cardiff charity founder nominated for Pride of Britain Award

We speak to Paul from Boomerang Cardiff on his nomination for a Pride of Britain Award.

Transcript

00:00People are believing, I get upset, people are believing in me, because when nobody believed

00:08in me I was ready to end it. Now people are believing in me, watch this space, so much

00:13more is going to happen and we're going to help so many more people.

00:17Paul tells me the boomerang started after some of his darkest days, being made homeless

00:21through no fault of his own, and he saw how easy it was for people to fall through the

00:25cracks. He says he's incredibly proud of everything that his organisation does for

00:30people.

00:31And when Boomerang was created in 2016, I generated my own safety net around me and

00:39around those who helped me help others. And to date, we've helped 47,000 families, employing

00:4820 staff, 11 off the streets of Cardiff, who were rough sleepers or homeless, and created

00:57a network around me, which upon reflection in the last nine months, I'm proud of.

01:04Certainly isn't every day that you get nominated for a Pride of Britain award, and Paul says

01:08it came as quite a shock when he received the phone call telling him the news, and it

01:11certainly wasn't what he was expecting.

01:14And then to have the phone call from ITV saying, we need to speak to you, I was like,

01:19oh no, what's wrong? I instantly thought, what's wrong? Have we done something wrong?

01:24In a nutshell, to be recognised, it ain't about me, it's about Boomerang organisation.

01:30We collectively as a community have created something which will hopefully be a legacy

01:35and a sustainable project for decades and decades to come. We have classes here with

01:43kids and not so long ago, I had a chat with, I think she was seven, and she said, when

01:50I grow up, I want to be a Boomeranger. And I'm like, do you know what? That's awesome.

01:56So we're doing something right.