I was back in London on Thursday for a working lunch organised by Community Matters and hosted by the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services. This informal gathering brought together more than a dozen national organisations representing community groups, many of whom used to be members of the Community Sector Coalition. We had a fascinating and wide-ranging discussion on topics including a broader vision for community finance, opportunities for autonomous and self-directed social action and connection with young people. We agreed to continue to meet occasionally as an informal group rather than trying to create a new alliance or coalition.
Robin Simpson.
Filed under: meetings | Tags: CLG, DCMS, Northern Ireland, politics, research, UK, volarts, Wales
On Tuesday I was at Cecil Sharp House in London for our ‘Growing the Grassroots’ event. This was a seminar to launch the initial findings of our Connected Communities research project, funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council, which has been looking at ‘The Role of Grassroots Arts Activities in Communities’. This project is a collaboration between Voluntary Arts, the Third Sector Research Centre at the University of Birmingham, the University of Exeter and the University of Glamorgan. On Tuesday our initial findings were announced by Ed Vaizey MP, the Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries. The Minister started by saying:
“In 2008 my Department, along with the Arts Council, decided to commission research to gain a clearer understand of just what the scale of national voluntary and amateur arts activity truly was. The publication of that research – Our Creative Talent – gave an excellent insight into what was happening and where. In fact, it provided some pretty impressive stats in terms of just how many individuals were getting involved in voluntary arts. It revealed that there were more than 49,000 amateur arts groups in England with an estimated 5.9 million members. Then, add to that the further 3.5 million people volunteering as extras or helpers. Which isn’t bad going for a sector that had sometimes struggled to be noticed in terms of its influence. So we know this is not about a few people dabbling here and there, but about a serious commitment by a considerable number of individuals. People who are involved in the voluntary arts come to it with a great deal of passion, with no financial reward … The result of all the enthusiasm and commitment people put into these groups is often really terrific work. So given that their efforts and achievements are not surrounded by the award brouhaha often associated with the professional arts, I was delighted to attend the first Voluntary Arts Epic Awards earlier in the year. Those Awards I felt, really provided an opportunity for hard working and dedicated people in the voluntary arts world to receive some well-deserved plaudits, and also to raise the profile of what they are doing.”
Ed Vaizey then read a summary of the initial findings of our research:
“1. The voluntary arts impact on the individual, through such benefits as improved health and well-being, increased self-esteem and friendships.
2. They impact on the wider community – helping to provide a collective identity, improving areas in which people live and aiding social cohesion.
3. They impact on educational attainment, with some participants experiencing an increase in literacy, verbal, technical and communication skills. Participation can also broaden people’s cultural horizons and encourage experimentation and innovation.
4. They impact on the local and wider economy, for example through people coming to local areas to attend voluntary arts events and the purchase from local businesses of materials and equipment.
5. Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the amateur arts are about having fun. The study so far shows that many participants viewed their arts activity as much more than a hobby. Engagement gave them – or gives them – personal fulfilment. Amateur arts enables people to discover new sides to their personality, to be creative, take risks and try new mediums.”
The Minister’s speech was followed by a presentation about the resarch by Jenny Phillimore from the Third Sector Research Centre and Jane Milling from the University of Exeter. This set the scene for a series of detailed discussions as we used the day to explore the validity of our initial conclusions and to develop our thinking about how to collect evidence of the impact of grassroots arts activity. The event was attended by representatives of voluntary arts groups and umbrella bodies as well as the Arts Council of Wales, Arts Council of Northern Ireland, Carnegie UK Trust, Department for Communities and Local Government, Royal Shakespeare Company and a range of other policymakers, academics and funders.
We also enjoyed wonderful performances by the Cecil Sharp House Community Choir and Dance Around the World and heard about the amazing Quilts 4 London project. It was a great day and the research team went away with masses of notes to assimilate before we write our final report. Congratulations and many thanks to Lindsey and Daniel for a very well organised event. You can see photos from Growing the Grassroots at: http://www.flickr.com/search/groups/?q=growingthegrassroots&m=pool&w=1603395%40N23&z=t
Robin Simpson.
I was back in London Thursday for a meeting of the NCVO Members Assembly. This was the first Members Assembly meeting to be chaired by the new NCVO Chair, the former BBC newsreader Martyn Lewis. The first part of the meeting took the form of a version of ‘Question Time’, chaired by Martyn. Representatives of three local authorities and voluntary organisations operating in those local authority areas formed a panel to discuss ‘localism’. The format worked well with prepared questions from the floor provoking a thoughtful and interesting debate. I was particularly interested in a discussion about how national voluntary organisations are going to engage in localism which included the observation that specialist expertise from national organisations should be used in conjunction with practical delivery by local voluntary organisations.
Robin Simpson.
Filed under: meetings | Tags: arts, CLG, England, ncvo, politics, vcs, volarts, volunteering
On Tuesday I was in London to speak at the NCVO Annual Conference in a session on ‘Participation, the arts and social change’. The session was chaired by Tim Joss from the Rayne Foundation. I spoke about the massive scale of the voluntary arts sector but the need to appreciate that most participants are primarily motivated by the relevant artform rather than by the desire to effect social change. Tom Andrews from People United spoke about the ‘We All Do Good Things’ project in Herne Bay which involved 5,000 local people in a range of arts activities to celebrate and share positive stories about their community. Jocelyn Cunningham from the RSA talked about the Citizen Power project in Peterborough which is encouraging positive social change by enhancing the ability of people to solve problems in their own lives, saying “the arts is the necessary glue for keeping it all together”. The audience for our session included quite a few arts organisations as well as other voluntary organisations and funders. We had a lively discussion about the tensions within the arts between the intrinsic and instrumental approaches and between excellence and participation. It was wonderful to have a session within the NCVO Annual Conference focussing on the arts for the first time I can remember, Many thanks to everyone who took part.
Sir Stuart Etherington
The NCVO Annual Conference was an impressive and enjoyable day. Around 600 delegates from all sorts of voluntary sector organisation were present to hear NCVO Chief Executive, Sir Stuart Etherington, warn, in his ‘state of the sector’ speech, that “at a time when communities need us more than ever … there is a very real danger that some of our organisations won’t be there”. I was struck by the number of people I spoke to during the day who don’t yet know what public funding their organisation is to receive (if any) for the financial year starting on 1 April 2011. Stuart pointed out that one third of charities have no financial reserves and asked “how can you manage effectively an organisation if you don’t know your funding in 30 days’ time?” He called for the Government’s Transition Fund for voluntary sector organisations to be doubled and asked for clear guidelines for local government on working with the voluntary sector. In the afternoon we heard from the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, Eric Pickles. The Minister recognised the “immensely important role of voluntary and community groups” and he used the NCVO Conference to announce that “if councils are being high-handed I will consider giving our reasonable expectations a statutory force”. At the time I’m not sure many of us in the hall noticed the significance of this statement, which the NCVO website later clarified by saying: “The Secretary of State defined disproportionate cuts [to voluntary sector organisations] in his speech as bigger reductions to budgets than they [local authorities] take on themselves. He also gave a commitment to consider giving statutory force to these expectations should local authorities fail to meet them.”
Eric Pickles
Robin Simpson.
Filed under: meetings | Tags: CLG, DCMS, DIUS, education, England, OTS, research, volarts
This afternoon I have been at a meeting of the Learning Revolution Communications Stakeholder Group at the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS). Liz Lawson from BIS gave us an update on the various Learning Revolution programmes and initiatives. The Transformation Fund has provided £20M in grants to 317 projects (including our ‘Up for Arts’ project in Liverpool). The target of 1000 people or organisations signing up to the Learning Revolution Pledge has been considerably exceeded with somewhere in the region of 5000 pledges to date. There is still work to do on the target of identifying 7000 spaces that could be opened up for self-organising learning groups to use free of charge (or at low cost). The Community Learning Champions programme is up and running with 36 grants made to local schemes. And the contract for the online informal adult learning portal has been awarded to School of Everything. The main focus of today’s meeting, however, was the results of the Learning Revolution communications survey conducted by the Central Office of Information. Voluntary Arts was one of 12 key partner organisations who completed the survey. The results provided a revealing overview of communications relating to The Learning Revolution and a valuable tool for the Stakeholder Communications Group to use to improve the effectiveness and co-ordination of communications.
Robin Simpson.
