ECN General Meeting Minutes

Wednesday 2ndMarch 2016, 14:00 – 16:00

The Lido Centre, 63 Mattock Lane, West Ealing, W13 9LA

Acronyms: VCS: Voluntary Community Sector, CCG: Clinical Commissioning Group, LBE: London Borough of Ealing, ECN: Ealing Community Network, MOPAC: The Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime, BME: Black and Minority Ethnic, ESOL: English for speakers of other languages, CEE: Central and Eastern Europe.
Attendance:For full attendance see Appendix 1
Topics Discussed / Action Points
1 WELCOME & INTRODUCTIONS
Andy Roper opened the meeting and welcomed those in attendance, round the room introductions were made.
2 MINUTES AND MATTERS ARISING
Previous meetings minutes APPROVED
3. ARTS AND CULTURE WORK
The Arts and Culture Forum has been revived and will take place on May 11th, for more information contact
Rachel– LBE would like more involvement from the community with organising their events and are looking for ways to reach out.
John the chair is working with Carol Stewart, Taylor at LBE and developers to try and identify a site for a performance centre.
Because of Hanwell Community Centres central locations, it should be considered.
4. SAFEGUARDING WORK
Halima Noelle (Ealing CVS Safeguarding Officer) gave a presentation on work in Ealing on safeguarding children and vulnerable adults and on addressing child sexual exploitation. Halima went through all the resources available on the Ealing CVS website.
There is a monthly Children’s Safeguarding specific eNews that offers resources and upcoming training dates. To sign up to this please contact
At the moment Ealing CVS only provides training on children’s safeguarding as there is currently no budget to expand this further into adult safeguarding. However, Ealing CVS do have an Adult Safeguarding Policy, if you would like a copy please email Halima.
The Yellow Book provides an extensive list of resources, sign posting and model policies. This however, will need to be updated again soon.
The Prevent Project on radicalisation is now also under Safeguarding board programme at LBE, as it covers the process of grooming.
5. ADVICE WORK
BaljitBadesha reported on the new General and BMER Advice Services. There is a new General Advice website a triage line and a free phone number. This triage service will help identify the most vulnerable for face-to-face meetings at four centres across Ealing.
This service has limited scope, however many of the advice services work closely together and will refer/sign-post people with specific needs to a specialist service.
Ealing Specialist Advice Service (Ealing SAS) is made up of 5 charities and has been going since October 2015. An official launch was recently held in Ealing town hall and was very well attended, because of the high demand for the service. A new website is also being developed that will have an online referral form.
The first meeting of the Information and Advice Network at LBE focused on three main points:
  • Which advice services can be linked and will work well together
  • A simple way for residents to see all of the advice services available
  • A better referral system across LBE
Some advice information from the council can only be found online, the Forum felt that LBE should not move everything online, because of digital exclusion. Some topics need face-to-face support to fully understand a situation. Face-to-face also help with complex cases and can help stop misinterpretation.
The VCS cannot afford to do a large amount of sign posting for free.
6. LBE BUDGET SAVINGS
Andy Roper updated on the latest LBE savings for 2016/17 and potential impact on VCS Groups. From the information available on LBE’s website there are no further proposals to cut VCS grant budgets.
  • The main savings are within the Environmental Services Team.
However, the discount VCS organisations received for collecting waste is now gone.
  • Children’s services have been cut, with two family centres and five centres running after school clubs stopping to run activities.
LBE are now interested in commissioning the use of these buildings out. If you are interested, please contact
Council Tax in Ealing will remain frozen. This could have been raised by 2% to help fund much needed services in the VCS. The Forum felt the public would be happy to pay more if they knew were the money was going to be spent. This is something the Forum should revisit in Septembers meeting.
LBE has a new Chief Executive Paul Najsarek, he replaced Martin Smith, who has been in the role for the last six years.Mr Najsarek was unanimously appointed, following a rigorous interview process, earlier this month and will start work at the council on 11 April.
There is a possibility of arranging a mini-bus tour for new LBE employees. Giving them a tour of VCS facilities in the borough. / Revisit Council Tax
Invite LBE Chief Executive to do a presentation at the next meeting.
Arrange mini-bus tour for new LBE employees.
7. MENTAL HEALTH WORK
All West London Councils have been successful in securing money for a new Eating Disorder Service.
There will be a better service for young people in a mental health crisis.
This is a five-year programme; the VCS will be able to influence the project in future years.
There is a new Ealing Mental Health Forum run by Ealing CVS, this will help with better partnership, better campaigns and joint funding bids. For more information contact
Ealing CVS will be delivering Self Care workshops to large & small voluntary and community sector groups in Ealing. The main objective of these workshops will be to enable groups to educate/support/signpost their service users as well as to encourage, motivate and empower them to actively adopt the self-care ethos.
The workshops wills cover:
  • What is self-care?
  • Why is self-care important for your service users, staff and volunteers?
  • Self-care tools and resources
  • Common conditions and tips to stay well
  • Getting the message across
  • Action planning: how to integrate self-care work into your organisational activities
The first workshops will be 9th of June tailored to smaller VCS groups and will take place in Southall. A second workshops for larger VCS groups will take place on 13th June at the Lido. Click the hyperlinks for further information. The workshops will both run again in November this year. / Wo
8. VCS TRAINING AND SKILLS
9. PARTNERSHIP DEVELOPMENT BY SMALL BME AND SMALL HEALTH GROUPS
10. VCS AREA WORK
Southall Vision: Janpal Basran
  • Ealing closed the small grants, talk about consortia to fix it.
  • St James Company is developing a Grassworks site. Pail Prichard the Development Director attended SCA Community Forum and gave an update
Acton: Steve Flynnin
  • March lots of VCS and school opening their doors
  • Polish community event in May
  • South Action open day
GNP: Jackie Sear
  • The GNP website has been updated and mad more interactive
  • Women’s Forum will be celebrating next weeks international women’sday,They will be collecting data on “what women are think about”.
West Ealing: Angela Dodwell
  • Champions fund has secured £4000 for high street improvements/benefits.

11. ELECTION OF VCS REPS TO LOCAL PARTNERSHIPS
  • Lesley Dodd Ealing Mencap was elected aVCS rep on the Carers Partnership Board
  • ???i can’t remember if someone was elected in the end, check my emails? was elected a VCS rep on the Ealing Council Health and Social Care Scrutiny Panel
  • Barbara Tilley, Age UK and Jane Barnes, ECIL, were elected VCS reps on the Ealing Council/Ealing CCG/ECN Strategic VCS Panel.
/ Possible re run elections (only if turn out spaces are still available)
12. NEW MEMBERS
Natasha Mayger reported on 8 new ECN members since the last General Meeting in December 2015; Ealing Survivors Group, FibroAwareness UK, Getting Together, Hope for Southall Street Homeless, London Broncos Rugby League, The Children's Society, The Felix Project, The Pain Exchange.
13. AOB, INFORMATION EXCHANGE AND ANY URGENT ISSUES
ECN used to previously arrange three meetings a year with Ealing MPs. Rupa HuqEaling Central and Acton MP has asked for these meetings to be brought back, one of the three meetings will take place in the House of Commons.
Jackie Sear reported on the Hanwell Big Local has been fundraising for £180,000 space hire campaign. This will fund x2 apprentices 16+, x2 community gardeners and will help them open their own business if they would like to.
Small grants up to £500 to set up something to get people together and out/active.
Small investments project, e.g. to support small projects, such as being a Zumba instructor. For more information
Rachel informed the meeting that on the 16th March there will be a planning meeting for the Carnival. Contact Rachel for more information.
Jane Barnes – Ealing Carers Centre based in Hanwell, has recently opened a new centre in Greenford. For more information, visit / Advertise in eNews
14. ECN MEETING PROGRAMME 2016 -PLEASE PUT THESE DATES IN YOUR DIARIES
ECN General Meetings
Thursday 27th September 2016, 14:00 – 16:00: Centre for Armenian Information & Advice, 105a Mill Hill Road, Acton, London W3 8JF
Tuesday 13th December 2016, 10:00 – 12:00: Grand Union Village Community Development Trust, Weaver House, 6 Higham Mews, Northolt, UB5 6FP
ECN Ealing Health & Social Care Forum
Tuesday 19th July 2016, 10:00 – 12:00: Lido Centre, 63 Mattock Lane, West Ealing, W13 9LA
Tuesday 11th October 2016, 10:00 – 12:00: Lido Centre, 63 Mattock Lane, West Ealing, W13 9LA

Appendix 1 – Attendance list

Name / Organisation
Andy Roper / ECN
Anna Janczuk / Serenity/Polish Community Consultant
Anna Whitty / Ealing Community Transport
Asha Yaelon / Contact a Family
Assiya Amini / Afgham Academy International
Barbara Tilley / Age UK Ealing
Elena Sabatini / Certitude
Fiona Kewan / Impact Theatre Company
Fred Burley / Ealing Swimming Club
Halima Noelle / ECN And Voluntary Service
Jackie Sea / Greenford, Northolt Perivale Federation
Jam Lennox / Watermans
James Barnes / ECIL
Janpal Basran / Southall Community Alliance
Laura Ferreira / ECVS
Natasha Mayger / ECN
Polly Seaman / ECVS
Rachel Pepper / Acton Community Forum + Acton Forum
Sharon Thomas / Ealing Adult Learning
T.P Singh / Punjabi Theatre Academy
Tony Miller / CEPAC/CENI

ECN hosted by Ealing CVS, Lido Centre, 63 Mattock Lane, London, W13 9LA.

Registered Charity Number: 800684

Limited Company Number: 2223863 Page 1