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Available online at: http://www.norfolkpublications.org.uk/partnershipnews
Index
Welcome
Welcome to the Winter 2010 edition of our electronic newsletter, which aims to provide useful information for anyone who wants to find out more about the work of the Norfolk County Strategic Partnership (NCSP).
The main features in this newsletter are;
- Norfolk's Area Assessment 2009
- Your Norfolk Your Decision (participatory budgeting)
- Norfolk's approach to Total Place
- Norfolk Action (Local Area Agreement) Review and Refresh
- Norfolk Community Foundation
- Norfolk Climate Change Partnership
- Investing in Communities
- Update on the work of the West Norfolk Partnership
Norfolk Ambition is the county's sustainable community strategy and sets the jointly agreed long term vision for Norfolk, which by 2023 will be;
A place that inspires individuals and businesses to create, thrive and achieve
Communities that prosper, welcome and support
On England's frontline in tackling climate change and environmental sustainability
The Norfolk County Strategic Partnership is a multi-agency group representing the county's diverse private, public, voluntary and community sectors. Their role is to manage the implementation of Norfolk Ambition and the Local Area Agreement, which they do by;
- knowing what Norfolk wants
- understanding the big issues for Norfolk
- making it happen, by working together.
Norfolk's Area Assessment
Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA) is a new way of assessing local public services in England. It examines how well councils and other public bodies, working together, meet the needs of the people they serve.
The Norfolk County Strategic Partnership were delighted that Norfolk received one Green Flag and no Red Flags. The Green Flag was in recognition of our work on participatory budgeting, through our Your Norfolk Your Decision pilot.
There were a number of areas highlighted in the Assessment for improvement. These include:
• Skills and attainment
• Housing
• Delivering services in a rural county
• Health inequalities and health economy communications
Further details about Norfolk's Area Assessment can be found on www.direct.gov.uk/oneplace.
Norfolk's approach to Total Place
TOTAL PLACE is a way of working together to identify how local public agencies can deliver front-line services more efficiently. There are 13 pilot areas - Norfolk is not one of them but we have adopted the approach as one way of looking at areas for improvement. There are two strands to Total Place:
• The ‘counting' element - mapping money flowing through the place from central and local bodies and making links between services to identify where public money could be spent more effectively
• The ‘culture' process that looks at ‘the way we do things round here; and how that helps or hinders what is trying to be achieved
DEEP DIVES provide an opportunity to carry out detailed analysis of a particular issue or area and through that investigation to identify options for change. There is no single way of carrying out a deep dive, but in Norfolk we are making use of some of the whole systems approaches developed through the LEAPP programme. The Norfolk County Strategic Partnership (NCSP) identified two initial deep dive areas:
• Skills
• High contact families
These deep dives will run until March 2010, when they will be reported to the NCSP with recommendations for the implementation of any findings and sharing key learning for future deep dives.
The Public Service Leaders Board (PSLB) are planning to complement these thematic deep dives with geographically based investigations in order to gain a fuller understanding of how service delivery in specific localities could be improved and efficiencies driven out through more effective collaboration.
Norfolk's approach to Total Place Diagram
Your Norfolk Your Decision Update on the first year projects
It may seem a long time since 6 December 2008 when 100 local people decided how to spend £200,000 on projects that would help us meet our targets in our Local Area Agreement. For a reminder of the day, why not have a look at the Your Norfolk Your Decision film.
The Norfolk County Strategic Partnership has been keeping track with the successful nine projects.
Here is a summary of their achievements, however to find out more please look at our progress report.
- 3930 people have directly benefited from Your Norfolk Your Decision participatory budgeting projects.
- The projects benefit a diverse cross section of the community, focussing on young people, disadvantaged people living in both rural and urban areas and on older people.
- Projects are aimed at addressing multiple areas of disadvantage, as well as working with wider social areas such as employment and cohesion.
- One project has brought in 25 jobs and £3 million in additional funding in the last six months, as well as securing 130 new jobs from October 2009.
Annual Review and Refresh of Norfolk's Local Area Agreement
The Annual Review of the Norfolk LAA took place on 10 November 2009 at the meeting of the Norfolk County Strategic Partnership Management Group. Overall, the findings were positive with a number of areas of good progress and best practice being identified by GO East. This includes;
• Establishment of local multi-agency migrant worker forums
• Participatory budgeting and the Multi-agency Hate Crime Agreement
• The work of the Norfolk "Virtual School" for Looked After Children
• Comprehensive Risk Assessment of the impacts of climate change locally
• Norfolk Youth Offending Team gender specific interventions.
Annual Refresh
The Annual Refresh of the LAA takes place in January and February of each year. It enables our Agreement to be amended in response to any unforeseen circumstances, such as the economic recession or new regulatory arrangements.
With only one more year to go within our three year agreement, this year's refresh will be a ‘light touch'. We will be considering amendments to only a small number of the economic and housing indicators and setting some targets for 2010/11.
The refreshed LAA will be submitted to GO East for ministerial sign off in mid-March 2010. Once the refresh has been completed, discussions about the content of the third LAA will begin. 2010/11 will be the last year of the current LAA.
For further information, please contact Daniel Harry on 01603 222568 or daniel.harry@norfolk.gov.uk.
Norfolk Community Foundation
2009 was a very successful year for the Foundation. Through the generosity of its donors the Foundation was able to provided grants in excess of £800,000 to over 300 charities and community based groups across Norfolk.
This achievement can, in many ways, be attributed to the Foundation's success in attracting new donors to work with the Foundation and in particular the Norfolk 100. Launched back in 2007 the aspiration for the Norfolk 100 was to secure 100 individuals and businesses that would be willing to commit to donating £1,000 a year for three years. This provides the Foundation with funds that can be used for immediate grant giving and also build an endowment that would see grants being made long into the future. Ultimately this money is used to support the 4,000 or more charities and organisations which provide such valuable grassroots support to the Norfolk community. From each donation of £1000, £500 will be used immediately to support local needs and the remaining £500 is invested for the future.
With the recession clearly affecting both people's ability to give and charities ability to fund and promote their activities there is not doubt that the collective importance of the individual members of the Norfolk 100 is key. This allows the Foundation to support these organisations and address the many varied issues facing Norfolk communities. Since its launch in 2007 the Norfolk 100 has awarded grants totalling over £94,000 and created a permanent endowment to provide ongoing future support, totalling £142,000. Under the current Government Grassroots Challenge, the Foundation can secure 2:1 match funding on its endowment funds and this uplift will continue to ensure the Foundation's ability to deliver meaningful grants in the future.
The Norfolk 100 has been a huge success and remains a key component of the Foundation's offering to its donors, prospective donors and grant recipients. If you would like to join the Norfolk 100 or know more about how it operates then please either visit the Norfolk Community Foundation website which is www.norfolkfoundation.com or contact Graham Tuttle, Director, on 01603 623958
West Norfolk Partnership
West Norfolk Partnership
The West Norfolk Partnership (WNP) is the Local Strategic Partnership for King's Lynn and West Norfolk. Members include the Borough and County Council, NHS Norfolk, RAF Marham, College of West Anglia (COWA), voluntary sector and the police. Working together these organisations tackle the toughest problems across West Norfolk. 2009 saw the launch of several major partnership projects and the growth and success of longer-term work.
Doing Something Different in Fairstead
Do Something Different (DSD) is a major lifestyles project that encourages people to make small changes in their daily lives as a way of boosting their health and wellbeing.
The WNP has teamed up with the University of Hertfordshire for this work. DSD works on the premise that by breaking old habits and trying new things, people can shake off stress, have happier family lives - as well as shrinking their waistline. Initially this work is in Fairstead ward and is free for residents and Fairstead doctor surgery patients. 150 individuals and families have signed up so far.
Visit www.fairsteaddsd.co.uk. DSD is funded by the WNP with contributions from NHS Norfolk.
Open Road West Norfolk gets into gear!
Open Road West Norfolk opened in 2009; offering young people the chance to gain some under-the-bonnet technical skills alongside their school studies.
Based on the Norwich project, Open Road offers Year 10 and 11 pupils the opportunity to obtain a recognised qualification, whilst working hands on with motorbikes and cars in state-of-the-art facilities. The project teaches practical skills that can be used for future careers - schools can nominate pupils to send for 1 or 2 days a week.
Visit www.openroadtraining.co.uk. Open Road is funded by the WNP with contributions from the Norfolk Youth Fund.
Opportunities West Norfolk event hailed 'best yet'!
Opportunities West Norfolk celebrated its fourth successful event as over 1400 young people from West Norfolk high schools took part.
Attendees were given the chance to create a logo, build a wall, bathe an (electronic) baby and try a host of activities at this event designed to show the range of career opportunities in West Norfolk. The day included 40 stands, representing businesses, colleges and universities in the region, giving first-hand advice and information.
This project is financially underwritten by the WNP with contributions from the Borough Council of King's Lynn & West Norfolk, Aimhigher, COWA and Connexions.
Around the world tickles lots of taste buds!
Over 1000 people took their taste buds ‘Around the World in 80 Dishes'. The 6th year of this popular international food festival saw a range of businesses, community groups and local people celebrating their country of origin with entertainment and a mouth-watering selection of dishes to sample.
Parish projects
For the 5th year running, the WNP has awarded funding to projects in parishes with more than 10% second homes. This year 22 parishes benefited from £117K worth of funding. This scheme shows the partnership's commitment to helping those areas which see the impact high levels of second homes have on their community.
Projects funded this year include; new play equipment, extensions to village halls, refurbishment of sports facilities and restoration of a war memorial.
Plans for 2010....
The WNP will undertake work in West Norfolk's southern neighbourhood following a successful application to ‘Your Norfolk, Your Decision' and partnering with the Young Foundation.
This work will focus on improving recreational activities for young people across this rural area, by looking at what is already available and what young people would like to see.
The WNP were awarded £36,750 to add to the £49,000 they have already made available. This project is already underway; three events with residents and service providers have been held. The next steps will be to consult with young people from the area and take these findings to the steering group to decide how best to implement them.
The four-year government-funded Improving Neighbourhoods scheme in King's Lynn draws to a close in March. The WNP and the Borough Council have conducted a review of the programme and agreed to support a further three year neighbourhood management scheme in the town. The Improving Neighbourhoods team join the WNP team in order to provide more coherent support to neighbourhood and partnership working across West Norfolk.
For more information, please contact Ian Burbidge, Policy & Performance Manager 01553 616722 ian.burbidge@west-norfolk.gov.uk
For further information about these projects and those aspects of the partnership's work that we've not had space to include here please visit www.wnp.org.uk.
New Partnership on Climate Change
"One of the greatest challenges facing Norfolk today is addressing how ‘human-induced climate change' will affect the county. This understanding of climate change is now a mainstream economic and social issue, not just an ‘environmental problem'.
Following the launch of the Norfolk Climate Change Strategy last year, a new partnership has been formed - Norfolk Climate Change Partnership. Their role is to
• Provide direction and leadership on climate change across Norfolk;
• Manage and coordinate the overall programme of work to ensure timely delivery of the objectives in the Strategy and our targets on NI186 and NI188;
• Develop and deliver robust action plans, and stimulate longer term change, to address each of the Strategy's strategic priorities;
• Harness and take account of the views of a wide range of Norfolk stakeholders.
Find out more about the Norfolk Climate Change Partnership on the Norfolk Ambition website.
Investing in Communities - making the difference
The aim of the Investing in Communities (IiC) programme is to tackle deprivation by encouraging economic participation.
IiC identifies three broad strategic themes to address through the programme: skills, employment and enterprise.
One of the projects supported by IiC is the Open Youth Trust (OYT) which is a UK company limited by guarantee and without a share capital. Formed in December 2004 it aims to;
• Improve the lives of young people in Norfolk and enhance their opportunities during the transition from adolescence to adulthood, especially with disadvantaged groups.
• Work in partnership with key statutory, voluntary and community groups to make available information, advice and guidance alongside a range of constructive leisure activities.
• Enhance education and skills development.
The OPEN Youth Venue is a multi-faceted project and as such this relates to improving the life chances of young people through the enhancement of provision around key support services with young people in Norfolk between 13-25 years old, by collocation and collaboration of statutory, voluntary and community groups at the OPEN Youth Venue, Norwich. Working in synergy with the Venue will be a strategic outreach programme targeting young people in the deprived communities throughout the county. This element of the project is focused towards addressing deprivation present in Norwich and Norfolk.
The Open facility provides young people in Norwich and Norfolk with a wide variety of leisure, cultural and educational activities. It will also increase young people's access to a range of services offering a welcoming, appropriate and non-stigmatising approach.
As well as providing free access to comfortable and vibrant spaces for young people, the venue offers state of the art training and leisure facilities, a growing programme of activities and events and easy access to information on health issues, careers, training and personal development, provided by a range of voluntary and statutory agencies.
Testimonial from a team member at Open:
My name is Ally and I am a team member at open. In my job I have a lot of interaction with young people and have seen great changes in some of them after accessing some of the services which are located in the venue.
One young female has made such a positive change since the venue opened. When she first came in she had a lot of personal problems with alcohol brought about due to an unsettled up brings. She found out what services were in the building and has made such progress with the help of the Matthew Project, Connexions and Children Services. She is now a lot happier in herself; her confidence has grown and has now made new friendship groups.
Young people come in the venue as a place to hang out and meet with friends but more and more are coming in finding out about the services that are in the venue and accessing them. We have young parents who now go to the young parent club on a Wednesday with Children Services. Young people who talk about getting a job are now going to Connexions and getting help with CV writing and what jobs are available.
The Matthew Project has started holding an open drop in our cafe area on a Monday and Thursday afternoon and is getting a good response from them. They have also been help a young lad who comes in the venue and has been receiving information to help his situation which he would not normally had been about to find out on his own.
It is great to have these services in the venue from a team member point of view because if we get anything we are unsure on we can always point them to one of the services in the venue so the young people can get the most out of the Open as a whole.
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http://www.norfolkpublications.org.uk/partnershipnews