Fast forward to 2011, and Aspire Oxford had moved into the old St Thomas’s School in Osney Lane, which was offered free of charge by Christ Church College. It was a small team composed of only nine or so employees, slowly growing its grounds care services. Nationally, the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government had initiated its austerity programme in 2010 to realise huge public spending reductions, resulting in rising unemployment and cuts to local funding across England.