DO you like your coffee served with a side of social conscience?

The unique blend is now on offer at art gallery Firstsite where social enterprise We Walk The Line have set up a cafe where they will offer disadvantaged and unemployed people the chance to learn customer service and barista skills with the hope they can develop into being their own boss.

Coffee bean suppliers are paid at better price than fair trade, and delicious cakes will be served up by Colchester-based Good Souls Bakery and Unique Bakes.

Mat Corbett, who set up We Walk The Line with partner Kieron Tilley, said all the money made from the cafe would be ploughed back into the business.

He said: "We are aiming for that independent, artisanal level of coffee. There are some good coffee shops in Colchester and those are the ones we are aiming to beat.

"It has got to be good - you have to have quality as well as the social impact.

"Nobody gives money to charity anymore, you have to get out and earn it yourself."

Mr Corbett lived in Colchester in the 1990s after studying at Essex University but he says the place has changed hugely since he was a resident.

He said: "Firstsite was a bus station when I was here.

"There is a responsibility for us to teach people to do things for themselves, think for themselves and be creative.

"The lack of young people being able to do that is a problem all over Europe and in America.

"The end goal is to pay the guys here the real living wage and become a sustainable business, but for that we need people to come in and have a coffee and some cake every other day."

The idea for We Walk The Line began when a series of mysterious phone calls were bugging Mat.

He said: "I used to get these phone calls every week from who would withhold their numbers and I used to hang up or ignore them.

"I never knew who it was, and I never answered because I did not think it could be any good news if someone was withholding who they were.

"Eventually one day I answered it and it was a call centre worker in India telling me I had been miss-sold PPI.

"I put the phone down straight away but then a few days later thought maybe I should look into it.

"After a bit of investigation and a few forms it turned out I had been overpaying on my mortgage every month for ten years and was due my money back.

"Then it was a question of what I do with the money. Do I take a holiday? Buy a Ferrari?

"But I had been working in community regeneration for a very long time and I could see the system did not work.

"It was a case of get a job or we will stop your benefits.

"Me and Kieron met up and we had a pretty similar philosophy.

"In medieval times you used to work for your boss, and would eventually be set free and become your own boss - where has that gone?

"The current apprenticeship system does not support as many people as it could.

"From there we set up We Walk The Line."

Their first venture was a coffee trike where beans would be ground while the pair pedalled and have gone onto various locations around the capital while employing the disadvantaged but Colchester is their first destination outside of London.

Yards away from the new cafe, a similar scheme called GO4 Enterprises, based at Trinity Church, are also aiming to help unemployed people get back on their feet with training and skills.

Mat says there are definitely room for both projects in the town.

He said: "We know Pete Hope and really enjoy what he does but I think it is a slightly different target audience than what we are doing.

"Everybody should be doing their bit and you cannot have enough social enterprises."

Setting up another social enterprise in Colchester was mayor Julie Young's idea.

Initial discussions began before she even officially donned the regalia in February last year and the project has been supported by £49,000 of grant funding from the Department of Work and Pensions who will try and place suitable people who find themselves out of work at the cafe.

Links have also been set up with Kesed Church on Southway.

Mrs Young said: "It is something I have set out to do and have achieved it - I wanted something which could help long term unemployed people get back into work.

"I think this will be a very important legacy.

"The most difficult part was finding a venue, and we did look at a number of places but Firstsite ticked a lot of boxes - they had premises, tables, and were looking for a cafe solution.

"I am so pleased to be able to do something with a social enterprise."