Viva Brighton Issue #71 January 2019

INTERVIEW
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MYbrighton: Tim Holtam
Director and co-founder of the Brighton Table Tennis Club.
Are you local? I’ve been here for 15 years,
so no, but Brighton is definitely my home. I
grew up in London and my cousins moved
here from Hackney in the early 80s, so we
were always down here as kids. Then I came
here for university in 2005 and managed to get
a job as a lifeguard on the beach. I had such
a great couple of summers, I thought ‘this is
somewhere that you’d never want to leave’.
How did the Brighton Table Tennis Club
come about? As a kid, I played table tennis at
an amazing club called London Progress, so
I knew what table tennis could do for young
people. When I met (BTTC co-founders)
Harry McCarney & Wen Wei Xu we knew we
wanted to set something up for local kids at the
Brighton Youth Club. We were always quite
ambitious about what we wanted to do with
BTTC, but we never expected this. Now we’re
being looked at as a model of inclusive sport.
Who uses the club? Hundreds of people each
week: sixth formers, people aged 60 and over,
people with dementia, primary school kids,
refugees, traveller families, adults with learning
disabilities and loads more. We run outreach
sessions in Mill View Hospital, and Down View
and High Down prisons. There’s a view of
Brighton that it’s all kushty, but it’s becoming
increasingly apparent that there are people
who are being left behind and forgotten about.
We’re interested in reaching out to the fringes
of the city and giving them a seat at the table.
What do you like most about the city?
There’s so much great stuff coming out of
Brighton. I love the work going on at Gig
Buddies, everyone and everything to do with
The Bevy, St John the Baptist School who gave
us this building to use, The Real Junk Food
Project, Pro Baristas, Stoneham Bakehouse,
Park Life... People are doing amazing things.
So many people have come forward to help,
chipping in and volunteering. I’ve never felt
more supported.
What don’t you like about the place?
There’s a lot of social inequality. The visible
homeless problem upsets me and the fact that
people who are from here cannot afford to
stay here.
Where’s your favourite place in the city?
Here! The Brighton Table Tennis Club
in Upper Bedford Street. It’s an amazing
community where everyone is playing their
part. The way to make a resilient community
is to give people a sense of belonging and
allow them to make a positive contribution.
This place has given people friendship and
connections. It’s about social cohesion and
bringing people together. It’s got everything
and nothing to do with table tennis.
Where would you live if you didn’t live
here? Brighton is the greatest city in the
world. [BTTC coach] Harry Fairchild told
me that when I moved to Bristol in 2015, with
Ingrid, who’s now my wife. I talked her into
coming back within a month. Brighton’s a
special place. I’m not sure there is anywhere
else like it. Interview by Lizzie Lower
brightontabletennisclub.co.uk
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