The Executive Councillor for Community Resilience and Well-Being, Councillor S Bywater to present on the Community Transition Strategy for Huntingdonshire.
Mrs J Farrow, Chief Executive Officer, Hunts Forum of Voluntary Organisations will also be in attendance for this item.
(Presentation: 20 Minutes / Questions: 10 Minutes)
Minutes:
The Chairman invited Councillor S Bywater, Executive Councillor for Community Resilience and Well-Being to present on the Community Transition Strategy for Huntingdonshire 2021-2023. Councillor Bywater was also accompanied by Julie Farrow, Chief Executive of the Hunts Forum of Voluntary Organisations. A copy of Councillor Bywater’s PowerPoint presentation is appended in the Minute Book.
By way of introduction, Councillor Bywater informed Members that the Strategy had been considered by the Overview and Scrutiny Panel (Customers and Partnerships) and approved by the Cabinet, together with an Action Plan. The full document was available on the Council’s website. He reflected on the past 18 months and work that had been undertaken by the Council with the biggest change in working more with voluntary and community groups and a number of schemes coming forward to meet the needs of residents and communities.
Member’s attention was drawn to the 15
local areas around the District and the COVID-19 organisations who
had supported the residents of Huntingdonshire during the pandemic.
Councillor Bywater further highlighted the other key support
activities that had been delivered during this period that included
the
re-direction of £50k of Community Chest funding, direct
support to over 1.5k households and the creation of
‘wearehuntingdonshire’ website that assisted in
providing useful information and guidance and links to local
services.
Members were informed of the other key support activities that had been delivered since April 2021, that included the establishment of six community-led job clubs, creation of a new Resident Advice Team and further projects delivered with Huntingdonshire Food Network partners.
Councillor Bywater stressed that the strong coalition of the Council working with community groups and voluntary organisations had built a good foundation but did not want to become complacent about the return to business as usual and was keen to ensure that local capacity and resilience was being built and developed to ensure that a culture existed of being able to ask for help and support. In referring to an issue raised by Councillor Criswell at the meeting of the Overview and Scrutiny Panel (Customers and Partnerships), in relation to the importance of engagement with Town and Parish Councils, Councillor Bywater welcomed their support as a crucial element, as well as other external partners, with regard to levering funding to support community service delivery.
Councillor Bywater invited Julie Farrow to provide an independent view, whereby she provided a reflection of the amazing work that had been undertaken by the voluntary sector over the past 18 months and the impact that COVID had demonstrated what the voluntary organisations and community groups could achieve. Members were acquainted with details of the work undertaken by recognised groups, including Town and Parish Councils and community groups, in reacting to the demands of the pandemic that included the delivery of PPE, hot meals, food parcels and mental health support, as well as keeping residents connected.
Ms Farrow reflected on the positive impact of the pandemic that had improved the ownership and credibility with the District Council, County Council and NHS that some organisations had not experienced before. In supporting the Huntingdonshire Community Transition Strategy, it would also act as a mechanism to continue to work and support the community groups as well as building trust in the voluntary sector with the better connections to support and continue to learn from this experience and the impact longer term going forward.
In thanking Councillor Bywater and Ms Farrow for their presentations and work that has ensued, Councillor T D Sanderson raised an issue with regard to the difficulties with sharing of data between public bodies that had been experienced during the pandemic. In response, Councillor Bywater confirmed that historically data sharing had not been as positive as it could have been and had been working to ensure that the appropriate signposting was in place going forward to identify and encourage those individuals that may need further help and support. Ms Farrow also confirmed that difficulties that the voluntary sector had experienced in the sharing of data and the impact of the pandemic had meant that some of these barriers had been removed in the accessibility of the data, but she had already started to see the re-trenching of these barriers again.
Councillor Mrs S J Conboy asked for a message to convey and for Members not to forget in the consideration of this Strategy, whereby Ms Farrow explained that the voluntary sector was not always thought of first and encouraged Members to spread the message to talk to them early to ensure that they are there at the start of any process as some issues could be resolved quicker.