HERTFORDSHIRE COUNTY COUNCIL
HERTFORDSHIRE LOCAL AND LIBRARIES CABINET PANEL
11 JULY 2011 AT 10.00 AM
Update on Volunteering and Capacity in the Voluntary Sector
Report of the Director Health & Community Services
[Author:Tim Anfilogoff, Head of Community Wellbeing
Tel: 01438 844111]
Executive Member: Chris Hayward, Hertfordshire Local & Libraries
1.Purpose of report
This report provides an update on volunteering and capacity in the voluntary sector.
2. Summary
From September 2010 to March 2011, the Community Wellbeing (CWB) Team led a review of approximately £12m of Adult Care Services (ACS) and Joint Commissioning Team (JCT)/Primary Care Trust (PCT) funding on Prevention and Wellbeing services mainly in the voluntary sector. At six public meetings, 350 stakeholders fed back on the five main themes of the review and helped design the evaluation tool, which was then used to review 266 projects with 130 providers. The Sector has responded extremely positively despite the 25% savings to be taken out over two years, and is now working with us on the Commissioning Strategy going forward.
3.Recommendation
The Panel is invited to consider and comment on the contents of the report.
4.Background
Key Planks of Community Wellbeing Commissioning Strategy
4.1Herts Help (a co-ordinated information, advice and advocacy strategy)
Following a tendering process, POhWER (the countywide advocacy agency) was awarded the contract for the new Herts Help ‘Intake Service’. There will be a ‘soft launch’ in August. It is expected to deal with about 18,000 calls per year. POhWER will be able to build in resilience by virtue of the pre-existing contact centre for their Hertfordshire advocacy services and to ensure an advocacy response is built in at the beginning of information/advice provision if needed.
Herts Help is a product of the Prevention and Wellbeing review: a network of community organizations working together tohelp people find the practical support, guidance and information they need to get the most out of life. There will be one phone number and website address to help people find their way around the hundreds of community groups in Herts who may be able to help. People at Herts Help won’t always know the answer themselves, but they will know someone who does.
This service will allow much better marketing of local direct access third sector services with early intervention reducing (inappropriate) demand on formal services.
Herts Help itself will be a formalised network of ‘sign-posters’, ‘specialist’ and ‘comprehensive’ providers, monitoring flow between providers and quality assuring the network as a whole. Libraries will be a comprehensive information provider in the network, Citizen Advice Bureaux (CABx) comprehensive information and advice providers. Sign-posters will know how to refer direct to other voluntaries or via Herts Help. New clauses in all CWB contracts will describe organisations’ responsibilities to help improve networking and co-ordination of information. will be a key resource.
We are looking to Herts Help to demonstrate the value of co-ordinated county-wide responses from the sector to underpin improved local services at no extra, or at reduced, cost.
4.2Lunch Club and Day Activities Review (Older People)
A further review of the 49 providers of 68 clubs at a cost of £1.23m, will seek to establish how they could/should develop, their role in delivering public health outcomes as against Joint Strategic Needs Assessment data around local health inequalities, and their role as actual/potential local community hubs. The review reports to Health and Community Services Management Board(HCSMB) in October 2011.
4.3Older People’s Housing Related Support
These contracts relating to £4m of spend to support older people stay independent are now with the CWB Team following contract variations negotiated with the remaining 32 provider organisations. One major change is that contracts are no longer linked to tenure (i.e. sheltered housing tenants only). Contracts will last two years and during that time commissioners will investigate what new synergies are possible with the local sector as a whole, looking always for efficiency and resilience, and what model of housing related support may be required from 2013.
4.4Volunteering
Maximising the contribution of volunteers is critical to Big Society/Localism. The CWB team is developing new approaches which will include:
4.4.1‘21st Century volunteering’ – Better matching supply and demand of those offering time and those needing it, developing the Slivers of Time on-line, real time booking system used with Breakaway (and highlighted in the Giving White Paper). Tracker Survey shows people involved in local activities or volunteering are more likely to have high wellbeing and less likely to have low wellbeing.
4.4.2Time Banking – We are looking to get more schemes set up for less, thanks to the Slivers Technology (currently schemes in North Herts and Watford) helping to build resilience and community spirit/cohesion. Tracker Survey shows people who identify with the statement: ‘people do things together and try to help each other’ in their area are more likely to have high wellbeing and less likely to have low wellbeing.
4.4.3The County Council Policy on use of volunteers - Graduate Trainee, Sam Tappenden is collecting best practice to build the County Council’s infrastructure around volunteering. Initial research indicates:
- Some excellent opportunities exist in certain departments (eg Countryside Management Service, Home Library Service, Archives)
- There is as yet no marketing on of how to volunteer with the County Council and no Corporate co-ordination/rules of engagement (these are obvious quick wins)
- There has been a lack of take up of the County Council’s own Performance Management and Development policy around staff volunteering
4.4.4Third Sector Infrastructure Review: (launch at 22 July mini-Summit) ensuring the best fit between:
- what is needed/the outcomes required
- the resources available
- existing infrastructure (role of Council for Voluntary Services (CVS), role of volunteer centres/befriending agencies, Breakaway etc.)
- the requirements of the 11 Local Authorities
4.4.5Volunteering and Libraries:
- Libraries currently use 200+ volunteers to deliver the Home Library Service, and recruit young volunteers to support the Summer Reading Challenge for children
- CWB will be working with the LibraryService and other partners to investigate extending volunteering opportunities in libraries throughthe ‘community-managed libraries’ concept to see how communities that wish to see opening hours increase can be engaged
- As yet the evidence base about the use of volunteers in libraries is scant, but many other authorities are exploring similar opportunities, and we will learn from their experience. A recent Museums Libraries and Archives Council (MLA)report looks at 29 existing community managed libraries reviewed (ie 1% of England’s libraries): available at:
A more detailed document from MLA with guidance is planned.
4.5Broadening the Funding Base/Social Enterprise/Micro-Enterprise
Part of the message to the sector has been that while the County Council is having to reduce what it can fund itself, it will help them maximise take up of external resources. (Funding Information Gateway:
Social entrepreneurialism has had some success in Herts on the big scale (Herts Community Meals) and the small (Clean Sheets Laundrette) but is not well mapped/understood. We need to ensure micro business (often semi-voluntary) gets the support it needs to thrive. Organisations like Slivers and Community Catalysts may be key partners.
There are particular issues around viability of Big Society in deprived communities, and nationally there is a shake up of the charities sector, with a fall in registered charities since May 2010 of 1,600 (but also 150% increase in mergers since 2009). Locally the picture is still unclear, but CWB/JCT/Health & Community Services (HCS) Operational Teams’ work locally has helped some previously funded projects shift to Big Society approaches (Trinity Centre, St Albans, Three Ways, Hertsmere).
4.6 Other
Other areas being actively worked on include:
- Helping to create a simpler, more co-ordinated range of ways the community can get engaged/feedback (users, carers, patients, citizens, the community sector etc). This involves working closely with LINk/Healthwatch (supporting their Pathfinder Bid), the Herts Equality Council and the Hertfordshire Community Assembly
- Reviewing the Carers’ Strategy (family carers are 16% of the population, 1:7 of the working population, 1:5 of the County Council’s staff). Carers tell us that late/inflexible/inadequate service responses contribute to 1:5 working carers giving up work
- Developing the 50 key outcomes we (in partnership with the NHS, in particular Public Health) are trying to achieve through the sector, so we can communicate more effectively and confirm our investment is delivering. They include outcomes around Community Cohesion, mental wellbeing, economic wellbeing, and respond to the sector’s demand that there should be a whole system approach which understands real value (social return on investment) not just cost
- This outcomes work is designed to include the £11m of prevention and wellbeing spending on the Children’s Voluntary and Community Sector. Funding for children’s voluntary and community sector (VCS) to deliver targeted services has been allocated in two stages:
-those projects with sustainability issues were eligible to apply for an 'emergency' 6 month fund to support them during Children’s Services Transformation (CST)
-savings realised from CST (reducing management and other costs) were added to a pot to deliver targeted services, with the spending review as the key driver; 'every penny counts'. This fund encourages VCS to increase collaboration, develop innovative ideas/services, and refines outcome/impact measurement
- Small Grants pot to help local small projects get off the ground – Executive Member and Director of HCS to decide on arrangements – could link to any micro-business Dragon’s Den process (initial discussions with Economic Development under way)
- Simpler commissioning – especially for smaller groups. Feeding the sector’s issues into revision of Corporate Contract Regulations for November 2011.
5.Financial Implications
There are no financial implications arising from this report.
Background Papers
There are no background papers.
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110711 Hertfordshire Local & Libraries Cabinet Panel – Item 5