Imagine somebody digging and weeding your garden, in return for which you knit someone else a jumper.

Or you might service a car and someone else fixes your computer.

Everybody involved in this exchange of services in kind have signed up to a Local Exchange Trading System or LETS.

Unlike bartering, which entails goods in kind being exchanged directly with another person or a group, LETS is broader based – but like bartering, it discounts money as a means of value and exchange.

According to LETSLINK UK, there are about 300 such schemes across the country, involving up to 30,000 people. Bradford LETS is one of them.

Calvin Syres, from Eccleshill, is its administrator, and set up the website – bradfordlets.org.

The 41-year-old former Ministry of Defence civil servant – he used to train British Army recruits in maths and IT at the Army Foundation College in Harrogate – has been involved with the Bradford scheme for about three years. He says: “There are about 80 members signed up, from Bradford right across to Leeds, Halifax and Huddersfield, so it’s a wide catchment area.

“Unlike other such schemes in the past, where there has been a lot of bureaucracy and hassle, all the running requirements for this one are recorded online.

“When you sign up you get a username and a password. All transactions are recorded on the website.

“Systems are in place on the website so you can get a picture of the person you’re dealing with – whether they’ve been checked by the Criminal Records Bureau if they’re offering babysitting services, for example.”

The idea for local cashless trading schemes originated in British Columbia, Canada, in 1983. The man who thought it up, Michael Linton, described it as ‘open money’. In the past 28 years, LETS have sprouted all over the world.

Doubtless, David Cameron would be delighted. Groups of people doing practical favours for one another at little or no cost slots nicely into the kind of social enterprise embodied in the Big Society idea.

This also fits into the pattern of social enterprise outlined by Bradford-born Baptist Minister Andrew Mawson in his book The Social Entrepreneur, based on 30 years of successful community work in London.

Awarded a life peerage for his work in 2007, he said in an interview with the T&A: “Structures before people is the wrong way round. Entrepreneurs know that if you can’t get the people and the relationship right, it ain’t going to happen, no matter what structure you’ve got in place.”

Calvin wants local companies to join the Bradford LETS scheme. He says: “They can’t compete with national companies. They can join Bradford LETS and have work done for them. We want to engage with them to show them how they can save money and at the same time use the local workforce.

“There’s an organic farmer in North Yorkshire who wanted people to pick his fruit and veg for him; in exchange he paid them in organic meat.”

Tim Walker, head of Voltage recording studios, off Manchester Road, is an active member of the scheme.

He says: “I wanted some painting doing in the studios. In return I did some work on backing tracks for somebody else in the scheme. You don’t have to swap with the same person. I have also done some artwork for flyers. LETS is part of a national network – it’s quite big and well-trusted.”

Thinking in unconventional ways beyond the restrictions of politically correct practices is what Lord Mawson found made a real difference.

Community-based mutual aid networks like LETS seem to meet that requirement.

* For further information about Bradford LETS, e-mail join@bradfordlets.org.