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Maria Mills

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SCA Group is one of the longest running social enterprises in the country. Led by Maria Mills the company provides health and social care to people in the south of England.

Offering a mix of services, SCA delivers social care to 10,000 people each year, dentistry services to 40,000 people who otherwise would not have access to an NHS dentist and manages a community hospital, community transport services and a training and education centre. 

Maria joined SCA Group from Novas Scarman Group which she co-founded and where she worked for for fifteen years. It was whilst she was CEO of Novas that Maria was appointed to be a Social Enterprise Ambassador.

Empowering people is often at the core of any good social enterprise. This is what Novas Scarman Group does best.

Its innovative social enterprise work has helped establish a range of businesses that provide quality services and products to the public but also create real work and learning opportunities for people from disadvantaged groups, including offenders, people with mental health difficulties, women fleeing domestic violence, refugees and people with a drug or alcohol dependency.

Through contracts and sales, it provides support and community development services, as well as arts and enterprise activities, to more than 6,000 people each year, in the South West, the North West, London and the South East.

Novas also develops clusters of social enterprises based around Contemporary Urban Centres in London and Liverpool, and aims to “connect the streets with the corridors of power” though its campaigning and advocacy work.

“Working here gives me the opportunity to fulfil a passion for giving people chances in life,” says chief executive and Social Enterprise Ambassador Maria Donoghue-Mills. “The most motivating aspect of the work is giving opportunities to individuals who have had rough times, but have so much talent, and seeing them go on to flourish and give back to society."

Peter, 23, is one of those people. “I was at college doing my A levels and had some family problems. I was basically homeless, sleeping at friends’ places and carrying all my clothes and college work around in one bag,” he says.

“Novas gave me my own flat in one of their complexes. It was my first time living independently and they taught me about budgeting, and adhering to house rules. I ended up doing pretty well in my A levels and I am now a support worker for the company. The organisation has given me lots of confidence and transferable skills. It’s such a positive company.”

Over the last three years Novas Scarman has transformed itself from being a provider of large hostels to being at the cutting edge of tackling disadvantage through social enterprise. It has shifted away from grant funding to winning contracts for service delivery, as well as renting out premises, so that it now earns most of its own income.

Novas Languages, the former Liverpool Translation and Interpreting Service which it took over from Liverpool City Council in May 2005, has a turnover approaching £1 million and a network of 200 interpreters and translators.

Novas’s Floating Support Team for High Risk Offenders, operating across Bristol and surrounding local authority areas, won an ‘outstanding’ award from the Howard League for Penal Reform 2008 Community Programme, having achieved significantly better than average reoffending rates and major savings to the public purse.

Despite such successes, Maria feels that public service commissioners often don’t appreciate the added value social enterprises offer. She says that organisations like hers come into their own “when dealing with complex, focused issues that require innovation”.

“We can support the whole person and generate our own resources,” she says. “I wish more commissioners would start waking up to this.”

Currently, Maria is undertaking some project work for social enterprises, as well as some community work.  Furthermore, Maria is active in the initiatives of the Social Enterprise Ambassadors’ engagement with the Ministry of Justice and is promoting social enterprises in the provision of public sector services which add value to their communities.

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Quick Facts

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• At least 50% of the jobs Novas Scarman creates are for people the organisation is supporting/has supported.
• A report on Novas Scarman’s floating support team for high-risk offenders found that 89 per cent of participants kept their tenancies and were not convicted of further offences – significantly better than average reoffending rates and resulting in savings to the public purse of £4.7 million a year.
• Every year, Novas Scarman supports 6,000, mainly marginalised, people, to get more out of life. At least 99% of the vulnerable people the organisation works with are able to live independently after receiving help.

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