See recent press releases from the Commission for Rural Communities. This is a report that is available as a PDF download only: www.ruralcommunities.gov.uk/files/Recession%20&%20CC%20report%20211008.pdf

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23 October 2008
© Commission for Rural Communities (National)

 The Care Quality Commission is today (Friday) publishing two documents which set out how it will: drive further improvements in how the NHS deals with healthcare associated infections, such as MRSA; use its new enforcement powers to improve the quality and safety of health and adult social care services for the people who use them. The Care Quality Commission is launching a 12-week consultation with a wide variety of stakeholders on how it intends to use its new enforcement powers, together with publishing guidance to NHS trusts about additional requirements for registering with the new Commission in relation to healthcare associated infection (HCAI). Under the Health and Social Care Act 2008, the Care Quality Commission has a number of new enforcement powers to deal with underperforming services - to inspect and investigate, to issue a statutory warning notice, to issue a financial penalty notice in lieu of prosecution and, in the most serious cases, to prosecute or suspend registration. The use of these powers will focus on HCAI from 1 April 2009. The Act will come fully into force in April 2010, so during 2009/10 the new Commission will use existing enforcement frameworks in relation to other aspects of NHS care, independent healthcare and social care that the Healthcare Commission and the Commission for Social Care Inspection use now. Making streets safer can improve quality of life, writes Tony Armstrong, chief executive of Living Streets. Streets are the one public service we all use everyday. How well designed and managed our streets are has a huge effect on many other aspects of our lives – from how much regular exercise we take, to whether we feel safe using our local shops and amenities. Living Streets is a national charity, working to bring our streets to life by encouraging people to walk more in people-friendly public spaces. We strongly believe that this cannot be achieved at arms length, and it is our work with local residents, and local authorities, which often has the biggest impact on people’s lives. The introduction of the new set of national indicators for local area agreements, which give councils the ability to choose their own local priorities, has allowed third sector organisations to work out ways that we can help councils to achieve their most pressing aims. In many ways it seems set to streamline the relationships between charities like ourselves and the many local authorities we work with, as we highlight areas of shared concern. We think that small-scale, local projects, designed to improve the standard of our streets and encourage regular walking, have a significant role in meeting many of the most popular performance indicators.

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24 October 2008
© Care Quality Commission (National)

Making streets safer can improve quality of life, writes Tony Armstrong, chief executive of Living Streets. Streets are the one public service we all use everyday. How well designed and managed our streets are has a huge effect on many other aspects of our lives – from how much regular exercise we take, to whether we feel safe using our local shops and amenities. Living Streets is a national charity, working to bring our streets to life by encouraging people to walk more in people-friendly public spaces. We strongly believe that this cannot be achieved at arms length, and it is our work with local residents, and local authorities, which often has the biggest impact on people’s lives. The introduction of the new set of national indicators for local area agreements, which give councils the ability to choose their own local priorities, has allowed third sector organisations to work out ways that we can help councils to achieve their most pressing aims. In many ways it seems set to streamline the relationships between charities like ourselves and the many local authorities we work with, as we highlight areas of shared concern. We think that small-scale, local projects, designed to improve the standard of our streets and encourage regular walking, have a significant role in meeting many of the most popular performance indicators.

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22 October 2008
© LGA

Representatives from Higher Education and Industry met today as part of a Government plan to increase future ICT enrolments. ICT has been identified as an area of particular economic significance in Northern Ireland. This is in recognition of the fact that as well as being a sizeable industry in its own right, it also underpins many other sectors such as financial services and healthcare. This event, organised by the Department for Employment and Learning, and held at the Stormont Hotel, is an important deliverable of the recently launched ICT Future Skills Action Plan. Employment and Learning Minister, Sir Reg Empey, welcomed the workshop and said: “It is important that the Higher Education sector works with industry to ensure that employers’ skills needs are met. In order to grow and develop, our software companies need an ever increasing number of highly skilled graduates in key disciplines, such as computer science and software engineering, yet university enrolments in these subjects are falling and drop out rates are high. We must do our utmost to overcome these issues if we are to benefit from an improved flow of skilled workers in future years.”
 
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21 October 2008
© Northern Ireland Executive

The pilot Partnership Improvement Programme (PIP) worked with mixed groups from local authorities and the Voluntary and Community Sector (VCS) to build their capacity to work more effectively in partnership and to model a new way of developing sustainable cross-sector relationships. This summary report of the pilot, a joint initiative between the Improvement and Development Agency (IDeA) and the Aston Centre for Voluntary Action Research (ACVAR) will help readers to understand:  the policy context for VCS/local authority partnership working; the drivers and benefits of cross-sector partnership working; the key challenges, including local examples from the eight areas involved in the pilot. The report ‘ Making it real’ highlights important lessons from the pilot for both policy makers and practitioners, including examples of conditions that, if met, can help foster effective cross-sector partnership working.
 
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21 October 2008
© IDeA

Acevo and the Community Alliance have urged local authorities not to reduce their voluntary sector spending in the wake of the Icelandic banking crisis. In a letter to Margaret Eaton, chair of the Local Government Association , Acevo told local authorities to resist squeezing their grants to and contracts with third sector organisations. Scores of councils stand to lose money after the collapse of several Icelandic banks.

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21 October 2008
© Third Sector

CRC are working with Essex, Cumbria and Devon county councils to analyse the extent to which the National Indicator set can, in a practical way, be disaggregated to below the Local Area Agreement (LAA) geography level. This will enable local authorities and their partners to monitor and performance manage delivery within their areas to ensure that all localities and communities are served proportionately and fairly. This could also help councillors and communities by providing them with information about performance at the local and neighbourhood level. Read the full project brief: www.ruralcommunities.gov.uk/files/LAA%20project%20breifing%20note%20for%20external%20use.pdf

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16 October 2008
© Commission for Rural Communities

Cumbria county council is to offer special grants to local entrepreneurs who are starting out. The local authority is collaborating with Cumbria Chamber of Commerce on the programme, which has been designed to support people who are starting new businesses in the county. It is hoped that by encouraging enterprise in the area, up to 100 new jobs could be created in the next seven months. 

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07 October 2008
© Englands northwest

Councils are powerless to prevent a plague of betting shops appearing in  deprived areas, local leaders are warning. Under the Gambling Act 2005, which came into force just over a year ago, councils have no power to reject applications for new betting shops based on the number of bookmakers already open in an area. It means poorer areas with low rents are becoming a magnet for high-street bookmakers, several of whom are implementing large-scale expansion plans. In some areas, as many as six betting shops are now operating within yards of each other – a problem the LGA believes will become more widespread unless action is taken. “It’s very worrying that we’re seeing this growth in betting shops in poorer  areas,” said Cllr Chris White, chair of the LGA’s culture, tourism and sport board.
With money a big concern for most people at the moment, it increases the danger that those who can least afford to spend will be tempted further into debt. Betting shops have always been a traditional part of the high street, but in large numbers they can prove detrimental both to the character of an area and to the spending habits of residents,” Cllr White said. During consultation on the Gambling Act, councils called for the power to restrict the number of bookies on the high street (pictured). The LGA now wants the government to implement this power and has written to sport and tourism minister Gerry Sutcliffe to request a meeting on the issue.

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8 October 2008
© LGA

Thirty-eight voluntary sector organisations are set to receive a share of £30m of funding to take over disused local authority buildings. The BLF has told the organisations that they have passed the first stage in the assessment process to receive money from the Community Assets Fund, which it operates on behalf of the Office of the Third Sector. The grants range from £150,000 to £1m.

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8 October 2008
© Third Sector Online