Third Sector Employability Forum (TSEF) - Tuesday 8th May 2012

Liz Catterson (LC) welcomed those in the room – representing 59 third sector organisations. The objectives for the day were given as:

  • To allow attendees the chance to hear from Angela Constance, Minister for Youth Employment,
  • To learn about the Challenge Fund and contribute ideas to shape it
  • To discuss the current and future ESF Structural Funds programme.

Angela Constance (AC), Minister for Youth Employment

  • AC stated that what is required a national response to the national problem of youth unemployment, stressing the importance of an ‘All Scotland-response’. She wants to work with all Ministerial colleagues to ensure that all Government investment contributes to the agenda.
  • All sectors (private, public & third sector) have a part to play and will be asked to contribute. The third sector will be asked to make the most of its expertise in supporting young unemployed people.
  • An additional £6m has already been announced to create a further 1,000 employment opportunities across Scotland for 16 – 19 year olds through Community Jobs Scotland.
  • The Challenge Fund is a further £2.5m to support young unemployed people. The Government has invited the third sector to shape the parameters and scope of the Fund through this event. However, it will be:
    - Outcome-focused
    - Designed to achieve maximum impact
    - Focused on achieving employment outcomes
    - Targeted to support disadvantaged groups as well as the more ‘job ready’ young unemployed people.
  • The third sector collectively has a lot to offer but must rise to the key challenges
    - connecting more effectively with the labour market and engage with employers.
    - fitting with existing provision available through Employability Pipelines
    - keeping young people’s interests, including the most vulnerable young people, at the fore.
  • There is a very short time-frame for the Challenge Fund. The money must be spent in this financial year, and AC hopes to make decisions on successful bidders by the end of summer.

Paul Ballantyne (PB), Scottish Government

  • PB stressed that the Government is in the very early stages of their thinking in terms of shaping the Challenge Fund – particularly aspects such as eligibility criteria. That said, there is a need to act and make decisions quickly in order to allow sufficient delivery time in this financial year.
  • The ambitions for the Challenge Fund are:
    - to create the maximum impact, probably through very focused interventions
    - to get people into jobs
    - that interventions also include support for disadvantaged groups
  • Key Features of the Challenge Fund include that:
    - it will be developed in conjunction with TSEF
    - bidders must demonstrate strong evidence of effective employer engagement
    - there must be alignment with CPP Employability Pipelines
    - provision must add value beyond existing interventions
    - programme design must be evidence-based; considering both the needs of the cohort and outcomes
    - it must have reach in both urban and rural geographies
    - there will be a transparent, robust and fair assessment process.
  • Other considerations for the Challenge Fund are:
    - the possibility of introducing minimum and maximum awards
    - while innovation is welcome, the fund is not about testing completely new ideas; to achieve impact in the short timeframe they want to fund what is known to work.
    - they are open to the idea of working with Consortia arrangements - this may provide greater reach to local communities and smaller organisations
    - there will be an emphasis on capturing lessons and learning to take forward after March 2013.
  • PB set the following questions for the table discussion:
    - How do we achieve maximum impact through the Challenge Fund?
    - How do we ensure fit with employers?
    - How do we manage the Fund to support these ambitions?

Q&A to PB

From: Donna Mackinnon, SCVO
Q: Is the Challenge Fund being targeted at 16 – 19 year olds like other provision?
A: No, the Challenge Fund is to support the full youth employment cohort of 16 – 24 year olds.

From: Jim Sweeney, Youth Link
Q: Has all the money to be spent by 31st March 2013, or is there a way that a one year project could be funded if the money has left the Government’s pocket?
A: For now, Government wants to see the money spent by 31st March. There may be some room for negotiation once delivery is underway, but that can’t be answered in detail at this point.

From: Janice Hendry, Yipworld.com
Q: Consortia may be a good idea, but how does the Government expect consortia to form given the short available timescales?
A: Part of the answers needs come from the Sector itself, utilising events like today and existing partnerships/networks. These are added challenges and we need to take account of these as best we can within the available timescales.

Table discussions and feedback - please see separate flip chart notes available at

Hugh McAloon, Scottish Government explained that ‘we are not in a perfect situation’ with the Challenge Fund as there is not much time, money or certainty, and we do not know if the Fund will provide a platform for future years of delivery. However, he assured that Scottish Government would be working with SDS as fast as they could to give successful bidders as long as possible in which to deliver.

Liz Catterson (LC) – The TSEF Executive Group Development Update

Liz Catterson is the Chair of the TSEF Executive Group. They have been meeting regularly for about a year and are intended to represent the wider TSEF members and act on their behalf. It is a method to advocate for the sector with Scottish Government on employability matters. A mapping exercise has been undertaken by SCVO, but this is a matter Liz will come back to at a later date.

If any organisation wants to raise issues or concerns, they should feel able to talk to any or all of the Executive Group members. They are:

  • Liz Catterson
  • Dughall Laing, The Action Group (Vice Chair of the Executive Group)
  • Alastair Cameron, Claverhouse
  • Blyth Deans, The Lennox Partnership
  • Alan Boyle, West FifeEnterprise
  • David Cameron, Enable
  • Finlay Laverty, The Princes Trust
  • John Reid, Access to Employment
  • Karen Herbert, Real Work Skills
  • Margaret Wallace, SCVO
  • Robin Turner, Routes to Work
  • Tommy McDade, Barnardos

Dughall Laing is currently leading for the Executive Group on a piece of work regarding Workforce Plus refresh. The Scottish Government do not want an entirely new strategy, but are intending to ‘refresh’ Workforce Plus in the light of the current labour market situation. The Executive Group will be collating a draft response for Julie Bilotti to be submitted on behalf of the wider Forum. They will be sending out a ‘Survey Monkey’ as soon as possible to canvass views on this issue, which they encourage all TSEF members to complete as soon as possible.

Tony McGale, Scottish Government – The Future of the Structural Funds. The slides are available at

However, a few issues included:
- The 2013-20 Programme will support the Europe 2020 Strategy
- It will include fewer investment priorities and have a more outcome focus
- It will look to harmonise across funds
- Is likely to have thematic objectives (including looking at what works now and avoiding reinventing the wheel), and
- as matching is an issue there will hopefully be lessons learnt from the current programme.

Q&A

From: Finlay Laverty, Princes Trust
Q: Is there currently any indication of the scale of the 2014–2020 programme?
A: We don’t know exactly. It will almost certainly be a smaller programme, however, there will be increased opportunity for pooling the separate Structural Funds for projects that are supporting multiple objectives – so there will still be money available.

From: Donna Mackinnon, SCVO
Q: Is there a delay expected in the start of the 2014–2020 programme?
A: There are no delays expected at the moment, but it will depend on the commissioning agreement.

From: Janice Hendry, Yipworld.com
Q: Is there any chance of the Government putting on training events/updates for organisations on how to apply for ESF money?
A: It is almost certainly too late to apply for the current round of funding now – although they did hold events of that nature when it was still possible to apply, and they are likely to be available in the future for the new programme.

From: Blyth Dean, The Lennox Partnership
Q: What access will the third sector have to ESF under the new programme?
A: The blog ( ) gives organisations the opportunity to feed in their views on this matter – there is still an opportunity to influence thinking.

Points made/discussed during the floor discussion on the current round of ESF:

  • Accessing ESF through either the CPPs or the Strategic Partnership means that some organisations struggle to engage
  • Audits are costly, but needs to be factored into the application
  • The Strategic Partnership was created as many national organisations were struggling to engage separately with 13 (often very different) CPPs and 20+ Local Authorities in order to deliver services across the ESF area. The Strategic Partnership reduces difficulties and administrative issues
  • There is a very complex landscape, particularly with funding streams (e.g. EU, UK Government, Scottish Government, CPPs etc.) – is there a possibility of addressing this?
  • There is a complete ‘disconnect’ between national voluntary organisations and CPPs. It is ‘exhausting’ being a provider in this landscape
  • Can Government provide more clarity on whether there is an expected approach to be taken by third sector organisations wanting to access ESF? (i.e. CPPs or Strategic Partnership)
  • Is there any indication that 2014–2020 ESF will come with age profiles/targeting?
  • The ESF audit regime can be quite burdensome on providers. However, this is not going to change going forward, so should be anticipated/accounted for when bidding
  • Not all third sector organisations are national – for some smaller organisations, the CPPs act as champions
  • Match funding is increasingly hard to source. Can anything be done to make the process less intrusive on partners? Some funders, such as NHS partnerships, may be deterred from providing match if they have to be subject to the same project audits
  • We assume CPPs are engaging with the third sector, but how do we know? Some are better than others – is there any way of holding them to account on this?

ESF Table Discussions - Points fed back to the room

  • There is wide variation in practice across CPPs, can this be made a more consistent framework across the county
  • There is an information gap for organisations wanting to apply through either CPPs or the Strategic Partnership
  • If better information on how to access ESF through CPPs cannot be provided, perhaps the alternative is to revert to Challenge Funds?
  • If CPPs are going to be the way ESF is allocated in the future, there is a need to address the inconsistencies across the CPPs. There needs to be greater clarity of both provision and relationships
  • Can there be better integration of the national and local approaches as there are benefits in both? Perhaps there is a need to introduce a National Quality Framework?

Ideas for future TSEF work/sessions

  • Feedback on the Challenge Fund consultation process
  • Welfare Reform
  • Clarification between roles of UK Government’s ‘Welfare to Work’ agenda and Scottish Government’s ‘employability’ agenda
  • Third sector responding to Curriculum for Excellence.

It was suggested that the next meeting of the wider group would be after the summer holidays. If participants have comments on the forum, and any issues or suggestions they’d like to discuss at future TSEF they are welcome to email

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