Bristol campaigner Lawrence Hoo receives honorary degree

Dr Lawrence Hoo has worked with inner city communities for two decades

A Bristol poet whose early life saw him go to eight schools, spend time in care and live in "lawless" neighbourhoods has received an honorary degree.

Lawrence Hoo has been awarded the Degree of Letters from the University of Bristol, to become "Dr Hoo".

He accepted the award on behalf of the communities he works with.

He said: "Being Dr Hoo still cracks me up. When I tell people they fall about laughing."

In his speech, he told young people "don't give up on yourself and try to be the best you can in whatever you're doing".

Speaking after the ceremony, Dr Hoo also spoke of his "complicated" upbringing in Bristol, Somerset and Birmingham, during which he witnessed violence from a young age and was subjected to racist abuse.

He did well in his 11 plus exam, and was initially offered a place at a private boarding school.

But he said the offer was later mysteriously revoked, leaving him disillusioned. "I had a lot of mischief in my bones, and it accelerated that," he said.

Documenting his neighbourhood

Dr Hoo ended up in a children's residential home, left school aged 16, and by the age of 23 had been diagnosed with cancer.

"I decided life didn't want to be kind to me. My life turned dark after that, I lived off the streets," he said.

He started to turn his life round when he became a father for the first time in his late 20s.

Documenting the prostitution, drug dealing and gang violence in his neighbourhood, he filmed the area and took photos, and started writing about it in his poetry.

"I wanted to protect my children," he said. "I filmed everywhere, even in crack houses," he said.

"People said it was a risk, but for me, not doing it was the risk."

His latest project CARGO Classroom offers pupils, aged 5 to 14, lessons about people from Africa and of African diaspora descent. The University of Bristol's School of Education is assisting with the lessons.

Bristol Prof Steve Eichhorn called Lawrence Hoo a "maverick"