Measuring What Matters

Presentations from the March conference on ‘Measuring What Matters’ run by CDAS and partners are available here.

They include the following, and may well be of interest to people who were unable to attend the event:

• Measuring wellbeing and sustainable welfare –why it matters: Nic Marks, New Economics Foundation
• The Genuine Progress Index in Atlantic Canada: Ron Colman, GPI Atlantic
• Measuring local wellbeing in Scotland: Colin Mair, Chief Executive, Improvement Service
• The National Performance Framework: Maureen Bruce, Head of Performance, Scottish Government Strategy and Performance Division.

Valuing Young People

The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, Fiona Hyslop, MSP, today (27th April) launched ‘Valuing Young People: Principles and connections’. This provides new guidance and principles underpinning how all agencies in Scotland can help young people to fulfill their potential. The Scottish Government says “it will help schools, teachers, community groups and other agencies work together to involve young people in decision making and provide more joined-up services”. A diversity of supporters and partners were integral to its drafting and delivery. The key principles are, in summary:

“We will work together to:

• deliver services that reflect the reality of young people’s lives …
• work with local partners to address barriers and gaps …
• recognise and promote young people’s positive contribution to their communities, and as national and global citizens
• involve young people at an early stage … in developing services and opportunities in the context of community priorities.”

Voluntary Action Scotland

The new umbrella body for Scottish Councils for Voluntary Service has elected its first board and decided on the name ‘Voluntary Action Scotland’. Seven national and four regional representatives were elected to sit on its board. More details

Passing judgment on Community Empowerment Plan

Local People Leading, who were involved in drafting the recent Scottish Government/ COSLA Community Empowerment Action Plan, have produced a document analysing how far their ideas have been incorporated. They welcome many aspects of the plan, but also make critical comments including:

• “No reference or even recognition (?) of the need for a specific community sector development strategy.”
• “The CEAP contains very little which falls under the heading of double devolution and even this statement sets community responsibility within the context of achieving Single Outcome Agreement outcomes which the community may or may not have had a strong influence in shaping.”

Partnerships between Community and Voluntary Sector Organisations and Anticipatory Care

NHS Health Scotland will lead a programme of work in 2009 / 2010 to support the development of partnerships between community and voluntary sector organizations and Anticipatory Care (AC) programmes in Scotland.  The anticipatory care model currently being piloted is the Keep Well programme. Two key aspects have been identified:

1. Working with community and voluntary organisations and groups to improve the uptake and reach of Anticipatory Care among people from ‘harder to engage’ segments of the community.
2. Developing referral and improving access to the broader range of health and wellbeing services and resources provided by community and voluntary organisations and groups.

A consultation is being undertaken on a paper outlining the proposed plan of work.  To view the consultation paper, click here.  (If asked for a password, just press ‘cancel’ and proceed)

Freedom of Information and the Voluntary Sector

New resources to support the voluntary sector in using Freedom of Information (FOI) laws have been launched by the Scottish Information Commissioner.  The resources include a web-portal for voluntary sector organisations with advice and guidance on how to make use of the FOI ‘right to information’, and an enquiry service providing one-to-one support.  Find out more here.

Websites

The website for the new CLD Standards Council is now up and running at http://www.cldstandardscouncil.org.uk/.

Local People Leading, an alliance of national networks and community groups in Scotland that has been created to campaign for a strong and independent community sector has launched a new website at http://www.localpeopleleading.co.uk/ .

The Poverty Alliance has comprehensively revised and re-designed its website at http://www.povertyalliance.org/. This month it has added two new briefing papers, on unemployment in Scotland and on the intersection of gender, ethnicity and poverty in the UK.

Publications

Community Development in local authorities
The Community Development Foundation has published a short summary of research looking at what role community development teams play should in local authorities, and what structures teams are most effective in.

It lists the types of structure that currently exist in England:

• Corporate – centralised model
• Departmental – with corporate responsibility model
• Departmental – service specific model
• Fragmented model
• Contracted model

and identifies some key factors for effective structures.

Community renewable energy toolkit
The Scottish Government has published a community renewable energy toolkit to help community groups to develop renewable energy projects.

Governance and Leadership of the Third Sector
The report of a research project into the leadership and governance practices of Scottish Third Sector organisations, along with presentations and discussions from the event at which it was launched, is available here.

The report concludes that generally speaking, boards do seem to be performing fairly effectively, but some areas require attention, and the critical ones relate to:

• The relationship between the Chair and the Chief Officer
• The Chair’s role in encouraging peer appraisal of board members and evaluating the performance of other board members
• The Chair encouraging feedback on his/her own performance.

The research was carried out by Cranfield University School of Management with input from research partners: ACOSVO (Association of Chief Officers of Scottish Voluntary Organisations), OSCR and the SVA (Supporting Voluntary Action) programme.

Changing for Good
The ‘Every Action Counts’ programme in England and Wales has published a guide to how to put sustainable development into practice inside community organisations by planning. It provides guidance on research, who to involve, assessing what you are already doing, and drawing up an action plan.

Muslim communities
The Department of Communities and Local Government has published a series of reports on ‘Understanding Muslim Ethnic Communities’. The reports cover thirteen different communities in England originating from Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Iran, Iraq, Morocco, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia and Turkey. A summary report provides an overview.

Connecting Civil Society
The European Network of National Associations has launched a (very short) joint EU election manifesto ‘Connecting Civil Society’ which has been written in partnership with national umbrella groups in 14 countries. It aims to promote a shared vision of the needs of voluntary, community and non-profit organisations across Europe.