More than 200 senior IT industry professionals slept out
next to London's Tower Bridge on a drizzly September night, raising
at least £200,000 for charity NCH.
The Byte Night sleepers heard messages of support from London mayor
Ken Livingstone and actress Jenny Agutter, who has helped the
fundraising event over several years.
"Byte Night is a fine example of technology and the IT industry
working to raise awareness of the homeless," said Livingstone. "We
need to bring to an end the social exclusion that homelessness
brings."
Livingstone raised an ironic laugh as his recorded message wished
everyone a dry night.
The drizzle served to boost the spirit of camaderie among the many
competing sectors of the IT industry. The sleepers included the UK
heads of many leading companies, including Hewlett-Packard, IBM,
Cisco, Intel, Sun, Banner, Harvey Nash, Anite, and the European
Technology Forum.
They were joined by directors from organisations as diverse as
Reuters, PWC, Barclaycard, Bird & Bird, Ernst & Young,
Unisys, Microsoft, Fujitsu, Vodaphone, and Kaizo. Computer Weekly's
managing editor John Riley was also there sleeping out.
All were shown a particularly poignant and disturbing video
outlining the abuse that drives many children onto the streets.
Articulating the mood following that showing, Steve Gill, UK chief
executive of Hewlett-Packard, told Computer Weekly, "If you had
asked me before the video I would have talked about the belief that
individuals can make a difference - that we in IT lead very
different lives and this gives us an opportunity to put something
back. But that all sounds tame after looking at the video. Byte
Night is an opportunity to use our company name to help raise
money."
Before crawling into their sleeping bags, everyone enjoyed a
reception in City Hall, a quiz hosted by ITN newsreader Felicity
Barr, and a charity auction conducted by actor Jack Ellis which
raised £4,000.
Helping disadvantaged children: the work of
NCH
Byte Night fundraiser James Bennet, managing director of the
European Technology Forum, drew attention to NCH's independent
visitors programme, where people unconnected with the charity or
social work field arrange to see a child in care on a regular basis
to help provide some stability in their lives.
Bennet, an independent visitor himself, said, "They are looking
for people who are not in the system - not paid for caring - to
come unconditionally."
Among the IT-related activities
NCH carries out is a programme
launched in April called Access to IT. Led by former British
Aerospace test pilot Kam Mataru, who is on secondment from BAE to
NCH, Access to IT aims to provide computer access for disadvantaged
children.
It is currently conducting three pilots studies: one for
disabled children; one for a family centre; and one for care
leavers aged between 16 and 25.
The programme is to run over three years and is supported by BT,
Cable & Wireless, Microsoft, AOL, Hewlett-Packard, BAE Systems
and the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists.