Big Society Capital

The Government’s social investment initiative, Big Society Capital, was launched yesterday.

The fund is made up of contributions from the four ‘Merlin’ banks – RBS, Barclays, Lloyds, and HSBC – and money drawn from dormant bank accounts. Its starting capital of £600 million will be used to invest in charities and social enterprises for a wide variety of socially beneficial projects. Organisations can apply for money on a repayment basis. This marks a significant move away from grants as … Continue Reading

FranchisingWorks receives £1 Million of Big Society funds

FranchisingWorks, a Greater Manchester-based organisation specialising in providing support and guidance to people wanting to start up their own franchise business, has been awarded £1 million from the Cabinet Office.

The money is part of a government initiative called the Big Society Investment Fund. In total this fund will release £3.1 million from dormant bank accounts to fund ‘big society’ projects in various parts of the country. The £1 million investment into FranchisingWorks will be put into their Licence fund, and will be used to invest in franchise licences, helping unemployed people without sufficient financial resources to start their own businesses. FranchisingWorks plan that this investment will generate a significant social return by creating new jobs. It also aims to generate a positive financial return including the full return to BSIF of the capital invested.

Alongside FranchisingWorks there are three other organisations … Continue Reading

Government and voluntary sector agree new compact

A new Compact was recently agreed between the government and the voluntary sector.

The Compact sets out the relationship between the government and the voluntary sector and is the basis for their partnership.

The new Compact features an increased emphasis on accountability and includes measures to improve adherence to its principles. Government departments are also required to be more transparent in demonstrating how they implement the compact. For example, departments are now required to include  in their business plans statements of how the Compact is being implemented.

There is additional help available to organisations through the Compact Advocacy Programme. One of the main functions … Continue Reading

Charities Act 2011 receives Royal Assent

The Office for Civil Society, in conjunction with the Law Commission and Charity Commission, have announced that the Charities Act 2011 received Royal Assent on the 14th December. The Act will be implemented into UK law by March 2012.

The 2011 Act is an attempt to streamline previous legislation, which had come under criticism for being cumbersome and hard to follow, especially for those working in a voluntary capacity.  The Charities Act 2011 brings together provisions of the Recreational Charities Act 1958, the Charities Act 1993 and much of the Charities Act 2006, all since amended by other legislation. The Act updates the text and simplifies the structure of the existing legislation.

The new Act does not change the existing law or introduce new policy, and Lord Hodgson’s review of the 2006 Act is still going ahead.

Cash Grants Available from Manchester City Council

Manchester City Council is giving community groups across the city a chance to improve their local neighbourhoods.

Following the success of previous years, the Council has once again set aside funding to help local people improve their areas and make them cleaner, safer and better places to live in.

The Cash grants scheme together with Proud of Manchester campaign aims to help local residents and community groups take on the projects that can make a real difference to their lives and neighbourhoods.

For more details and copies of the application forms, please click here or call 0161 234 3159.

Making Space Peer mentoring project – support for incapacity benefit claimants

My name is Natalie and I am the service user involvement and volunteer co-coordinator for the Making Space peer mentoring project along with my colleague Mike Jones.

We will be running a service to support people in Manchester with mental health issues who are now having their incapacity benefit reassessed. We anticipate that many of these individuals will no longer be eligible to receive this benefit and will be pushed back towards work whether they feel capable or not. The primary aim of our project is to offer support and information to people affected by this reassessment process. This includes providing information of the assessment process, to attend interviews, attend GP appointments with clients and/or to attend appeals and to offer general support for those individuals who have been assessed as being fit to return to work.

This project will be highly relevant to a significant amount of people throughout Manchester and as such we are very keen to make our services available to all, initially by advertising our service and company using leaflets and poster (attached). Unfortunately since we are a charity we are hoping to secure complimentary advertisement; if you could assist us in this matter by making copies of these leaflets available in your facility we would be highly grateful. Likewise if anybody utilizing your service would like to refer themselves please feel free to contact myself using the details provided.

Any other assistance you could offer would be beneficial and appreciated.

Kind regards

Natalie Martin
Service User Involvement and Volunteer Co-Ordinator

LeafletPDF

Work4you_poster

Big Society to be examined

The first audit of Big Society, and the effectiveness of policies to shift power from Government to civil society, has been launched and is expected to be published in early 2012.

Think tank Civil Exchange will be conducting the audit after consulting with Government, academics and others about how exactly to gauge the effectiveness or achievements of what has often been criticised as a woolly social policy.
The research, funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, will attempt to establish a ‘baseline’ against which subsequent shifts in behaviour and power can be monitored. The audit will also consider the effectiveness of initiatives by the last Labour government to bring about similar changes.
[from: Civil Society Governance 18.11.11]

Student needs help with Research Project on Volunteers

The Effect of Cognitive-Affective Interplay on Volunteerism: An Empirical Study

The researcher is (Shaheera Amin) from the University of Leeds; she is collecting data from people who offer their services as a volunteer. The research seeks to understand the role that a charity organization’s internal communications play in motivating the volunteers and their key influences on volunteers’ retention.
A survey will be used for the purpose of data collection and will take between 8-10 minutes to complete. The results will only be shown in graphical and tabular forms. All information you provide will be kept strictly confidential and no respondent will be indentified.
Thank you in anticipation for your assistance. If you have any queries regarding this study please use the following contact information.

Complete the survey here

Yours sincerely,
Shaheera Amin
Doctoral Researcher
Leeds University Business School
Maurice Keyworth Building
University of Leeds
Leeds, LS2 9JT
Email: bnsam@leeds.ac.uk
Mobile: +44(0) 7576293183

Global Xchange 2011 – get involved!

Greater Manchester Youth Network are excited to be running Global Xchange in Manchester, offering a cross-cultural exchange programme where young people will live, learn & work in local communities to develop individuals, communities and global networks.

In October 2011, a team of 20 enthusiastic volunteers (aged 18-25) from India and the UK will be arriving in Manchester to undertake voluntary work with local community projects, before travelling together to India for the second leg of the exchange.

The exchange will promote the principles of:

• Youth action
• Cross cultural dialogue
• Inclusion & diversity
• Partnership
• Innovation

Young people will get involved in communities in Manchester, to learn and take positive action during their time here.

Can you or your organisation help by:

• Welcoming the exchange participants to Manchester?
• Hosting pairs of volunteers (1 from the UK, 1 from India) for quality voluntary placements for 10 weeks from mid October for 3.5 days per week?
• Host pairs of volunteers (1 from the UK, 1 from India) in your home or help us to advertise to find host homes?
• Getting the participants involved in events in the community?
• Supporting us with practical help like the use of your rooms or resources?

Becci Cunningham, programme supervisor, says: ”We’re confident the experience will be a positive one for everyone involved as it will offer the chance to learn about each other’s lives, about issues in the community, and about global issues too.”

For more information contact Becci on 0161 274 3299 or becci.cunningham@gmyn.co.uk

Big Society Bank – renamed

The Big Society Bank has been renamed Big Society Capital and has unveiled its first chair and chief executive.

Big Society Capital will be the new name for the Big Society Bank. Sir Ronald Cohen, founder of private equity firm Apax, will be its interim chair, while Nick O’Donohoe, former global head of research at JP Morgan, will be its chief executive.

Both Sir Ronald and O’Donohoe drew up the proposal for the organisation, which was approved by government earlier this year.

Big Society Capital will be independent of government. It will be divided into Big Society Capital Ltd, a company limited by shares that will look after the money, and the Big Society Trust, a company limited by guarantee, which will provide oversight of Big Society Capital Ltd but will not have any day-to-day functions.

It announced its first investment of £1m in a social investment fund run by the Private Equity Foundation to help disadvantaged young people into employment, education and training.

The investment will be split with £500,000 as equity in the fund, which will have a payment-by-results model, and the other £500,000 to underwrite efforts to attract investors into the fund.

For more details please visit the website below:-

http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/content/big-society-capital