Carlos Corris

“Holding down a full-time job at Lakeside after being unemployed for three years has totally changed my life. I feel good about myself, whereas living on dole money made me feel worthless. I had no confidence and, seemingly, no prospects. Now my outlook has changed completely. I have never been so happy.”

So says 24-year-old Carlos Corris from Barrow, doting father of Charlee (3), and a man who means it when he tells you that love and work are two of the finest words in the English language. It was his partner Paula, who worked evenings serving in Lakeside’s Ruskins Brasserie, who suggested that Carlos give food and beverage a try.

First step was a nerve-shredding interview at Trinity House, then came the joyous news that he had been granted a place on the Academy’s training scheme and, within a few days, he was serving breakfasts at The Lakeside.

“Unbelievable, just truly amazing from my perspective,” he says. “You have to understand that since I left school at 16 I had spent many more years on the dole than working, and when I did work it was in dead end jobs like cleaning and shop work. When Paula persuaded me to go for that interview at Trinity House I had not worked for three years and I really began to think I might never work again – that’s how low my spirits were.

“To be frank, anything I had been offered gave me less money than being on benefits, so I stayed at home and looked after Charlee and Paula went to The Lakeside. She fired my imagination by telling me constantly what a great place it was to work and how supportive the other staff were, and so finally I plucked up the courage to attend that interview. 

“When they told me I had been accepted I just felt amazed and grateful. And when I started work at Lakeside a whole new life opened up for me. Bear in mind that I had never done this kind of work before, but I loved it from the start and I have loved it every day since. The training is so good, so thorough, that you feel totally supported from day one.”

Training Manager Sarah Kendall says: “His is a heartwarming story – he was physically shaking when he first came to see us at Trinity, but then that’s hardly surprising given that he had been unemployed for so long. But despite his nerves – he was just about petrified - we could immediately see that had real potential.

“Carlos has lovely manners – chivalrous best sums him up – and I never had any doubts that he would settle in and become a valued member of the Lakeside food and beverage team. Initially Carlos was working days and Paula evenings, which meant that they saw very little of each other at home and they eventually came to a decision that Paula would stop work and look after Charlee. We miss her because she too is a wonderful worker, but we have gained Carlos and we’re happy with that.”

And so is the man himself. Ecstatic more like. “I start early – up at six in the morning and at Lakeside, transport provided by the hotel, to start at seven. I finish at four and I’m home by five, in time to spend some quality time with our little girl,” says Carlos.

“Right at the start it took me a few days to get used to it – I would get home at tea-time and if I sat down I would be falling asleep. But I soon got used to my new life and now it’s difficult to find the words to explain just how very happy I am with it. When you’re long-term unemployed you fall into a rut from which there is seemingly no escape.

“And the great thing about the Trinity House Training Academy scheme is not just the quality of the training – the attention to detail – but also the hugely important fact that you can work the shifts you want to work. Some of our staff who have come through the Trinity scheme choose to work only two or three days a week. Others, like me, do a five-day week, then have a couple of days off. They go out of their way to fit in with you – that’s one of the reasons why they are such special employers.

“More than most, I suppose, I really do appreciate the chance I have been given. When I look back on those miserable, depressing days of dole queues and rock-bottom self-esteem, I have to pinch myself sometimes to realise that my life has been so transformed.

“I have Paula, my lovely partner, and our daughter, I have a job that I love in a beautiful place, I have many new friends and, every day when I’m serving breakfasts, I meet new people from all over the world. It’s all been so wonderfully life-changing”