International Repair Day 2024: “Everyone that wants to keep things in use for longer is welcome to get involved”

As the Co-Director of The Restart Project, which spearheads the Right to Repair movement in the UK, Fiona Dear brings a unique perspective to the challenges and opportunities surrounding repair and reuse.

Here, Fiona explains why embracing repair is a crucial solution. She shares her deep understanding of the environmental – and economic – implications of our throwaway culture. And she explains why the only way to drive systematic change is to work with policymakers, businesses and grassroots communities.

Whether you’re an environmentally conscious consumer, a business leader seeking sustainable practices or a policymaker exploring circular economy strategies, Fiona’s insights offer a fresh and thought-provoking perspective that will motivate you to embrace the repair revolution.

And if you take away nothing else, heed International Repair Day 2024. This global event aims to make repair accessible and integrated into our daily lives, and Fiona is part of the team working hard to prepare for it.

This year’s event is on the 19^th of October, so – in Fiona’s words – read on to discover how you can get involved.

Can you explain why International Repair Day has become so important and why it is growing in popularity?

International Repair Day has been running for eight years – it’s grown by itself – and it celebrates repair.

Each year, individual countries take it and do what they want with it. For example, last year France had close to a thousand events. It feels like it’s a bit more spread out across Europe this year. 

International Repair Day is a hook. It means that if you want to do anything political or even public engagement, you can tailor it to your own country. This is why each country does their own thing.

For example, we used Repair Day last year to launch a Repair and Reuse declaration. That was a political statement signed by a huge breadth of companies, repair cafés, and organisations that want to see policy supporting repair.

International Repair Day is much more than simply fixing devices. Would you remind our readers why repair matters?

The reason we need to keep things in use for longer is that we’re in a throwaway economy. Things aren’t made to last and sometimes they’re specifically made not to last, if you know what I mean. We’re throwing too much stuff away.

The amount of e-waste produced globally each year weighs more than the Great Wall of China.

The UK is really bad at this as we’re the second-highest producer of e-waste per person in the world. There are many reasons that’s a problem.

Part of it is that in electricals, there are earth minerals that we really need. They’re rare, valuable and used in wind turbines and electric vehicles. Throwing them away is mad.

Then there are also carbon emissions which are directly linked to our electronics. If you look at a laptop or smartphone and the amount of carbon emissions that are produced in their entire life, you’d think that most of it would be produced while you’re using it and it’s plugged in. Actually, 80% of the carbon emissions have happened before it’s even got into your hands.

So if we’re only using [a laptop or phone] for a couple of years and then throwing it away, that’s a lot of carbon emissions from our use of technology. We need to keep things going for as long as possible and the best way we can do that is by repairing.

But it’s hard. It’s harder to do than we’d like, but it is still possible. A community sprung up to meet that challenge, to help people repair things and keep things in use for longer.

Is International Repair Day purely for professional repairers?

Not all all. Most of the groups that we work with are repair cafés with volunteer fixers that know how to repair things. You bring your thing and they’ll fix it for you.

You get to see the process, you get to be as involved as you want.

Much of the reason we don’t think of repair is it’s an enigma. I mean, what’s inside this machine?

We’d encourage repair businesses to put up posters in their windows to show that they’re part of International Repair Day. Anyone that wants to be involved in keeping things in use for longer is very welcome to get involved.

Although The Restart Project’s roots are in volunteer and community repair, you’re producing business models to make fixing commercially viable and sustainable. Tell us about London’s Fixing Factories…

Community repair is amazing, filling a really important gap, but repair events tend to happen once a month or less. If you’ve got a kettle or a toaster that’s used every day, you want it fixed sooner. More high street repair is needed.

We know that because of the economics of repair and things being so cheap to buy new, we’re losing repair services. We want to bring community-led repair onto the high street and that’s where the Fixing Factory comes in. Volunteers are still involved but there’s a permanent presence. A place to go. People know that if something breaks, you can take it to a Fixing Factory and either get it fixed or get help to get it fixed.

Figuring the economic model is an enormous challenge. We hope to have more Fixing Factorys in London in the next few years. One of our goals is skills development, so we’ll be doing training courses where people can dip in and learn how to fix a toaster. They’ll also be more intensive courses where people can volunteer, do work experience, join repair clubs and become a fixer. Potentially even offering a fixing service at one of the fixing factories.

We want to rebuild that knowledge and see if there’s a financial model that works. Our vision is for a Fixing Factory on every UK high street, but at the moment we’re focusing on making that business model work.

The economics of running a repair business are challenging. How can this be quickly improved?

Agreed. Running a repair shop is really hard, and that’s why one of our requests in our Repair and Reuse declaration is zero VAT on repair and reuse. We need more repairs to happen, so there needs to be incentives, whether that’s from local authority or central government.

International Repair Day is vital in generating awareness about how the circular economy and e-waste are affected by repair. How attuned are UK politicians to the urgent needs of the environment?

What’s encouraging is that Steve Reed, in his first speech as Secretary of State for Defra, included circular economy as one of the top four priorities. That’s the first time it’s got that much prominence.

Since then they’ve launched a circular economy taskforce to help with joined-up working.

Part of the problem with policy so far is that it’s been a little thing here and a little thing there that doesn’t add up to anything. We need a joined-up strategy that really thinks through all the implications and then it’s something much bigger and more impactful.

Before the Brexit agreement, there was a promise to keep up with the EU legislation which expanded to smartphones and tablets. It didn’t happen in the UK. So, the other reason for hope is the commitment for closer working with the EU. We can expect more progress in staying in line with other European countries.

The UK government’s influence watered down Scotland’s circular economy bill because the UK government wasn’t ready for it. Hopefully, once the UK steps up a bit, it might mean it can raise ambition. There’s lots of ambition in Wales and Scotland, so England really needs to catch up with UK-wide legislation too.

Earlier this year, you hosted a repair event inside the Houses of Parliament. What was the reaction of the MPs?

Helen Hayes MP sponsored the event and absolutely nailed it when she said “Repair is so obvious that it just gets forgotten”. She really gets it.

A lot of the conversations with MPs were more focused on what was happening in their constituency. So, every MP that came in the room asked if there was a constituent there or a local repair cafe, and went straight to chat with them.

Some MPs talked about the businesses in their constituencies, because it’s something that’s relevant to their local constituents. People were concerned about talking to MPs about repair because they’re not an expert, but you don’t need to be. Just show that you care, show that you’re bothered enough about this to engage.

Many of our tech-savvy TechFinitive readers may be repair experts, others will be keen enthusiasts whilst some may never have changed a battery. International Repair Day is a great opportunity to learn some skills and make a difference. How can our readers get involved?

The simplest way either as an individual, as a business or as a repair cafe is to put up a poster to raise awareness of International Repair Day.

In October, whether you’re doing it yourself, whether you’re a repair business or going to a repair business or whether you’re going to a repair cafe, bring that poster, take a photo with your fix and then put it on social media with hashtag #RepairDay.

Our Repair Day Map gives details all International Repair Day events around the world, so hopefully there is something near to you. In the UK, we have 670 registered Repair Cafés and details of those can be found on the Community Repair website. The Repair Café website has details of over 3,000 repair cafés around the world.

If you are a business or a repair café, then it’s a great opportunity to engage your MP. Getting them involved in an actual event is so valuable. You don’t need to be an expert. Just show them what you are doing with repair. Talk about the frustrations of why it is so hard to fix. You’re an expert in your own experience and that is valuable.

Also, International Repair Day is not just about technology. I run a repair café in my local constituency, and I do the darning and textile fixing. Repair is anything that can be repaired.

If you have fixing skills and you want to offer them, go along to your repair café. You’d be amazed at how many more skills you’ve got than most people. There are always shadowing opportunities. You can talk to more experienced fixers, but it’s really lovely being a fixer in a repair café and I’m speaking from experience.