‘Halton Together Panel’

 

Themed meeting – Wealth & Equality

 

Wednesday 9th June 2004

At Sefton House, Runcorn

 

Present

A Bowen – North West Division Girlguiding, B Miller – Halton Crossroads, Hitesh Patel – CAB, Pauline Ruth – Halton Childrens Fund, Anne Patchett – Kings Cross Project, Wendy Price - Pre-School Learning Alliance, Beth Edwards – Windmill Hill Residents Association, Sharon Petersen – Halton Happy Hearts, B Edwards - Windmill Hill Forum

 

In Attendance

K Parkes – HVA,  K Marcroft – LSP, Matt Atherton – LSP, Nick Calland – Kings Cross Project

 

General background

 

Karen Marcroft opened the meeting with an outline about the Partnership.

 

w         Government did not specify the structure of the partnership but did outline the purpose

w         Objective – to narrow the gap between the more deprived and more affluent areas of the country

 

The partnership diagram was explained and the fact that the partnership works on evidenced needs and not a bidding system for funding.

 

The state of the borough report looked into the statistics for Halton and from this report, the 5 headings for the Specialist Strategic Partnerships (SSP’s) were formulated.

 

Each SSP then produced a report which looked into the statistics in much more detail, outlining where the specific problems were most prevalent.

 

Wealth & Equality SSP

 

Pauline Ruth (Chair) continued with the presentation and explained that the objectives for the SSP were not created by the members but rather they were given them.

 

The objectives can be found in the Community Strategy for Halton document which was submitted to the group.  Pauline explained that two additional objectives were submitted but these run across all priorities:

 

w         To promote a social environment to encourage people to participate

w         To enhance life for all individuals who may be marginalized

 

The partnerships are trying to co-ordinate work across the borough.

 

Pauline submitted a document showing where the funding from the SSP has been allocated.  This showed funding from NRF (Neighbourhood renewal funding) and also PF (HBC funding)

 

All the projects supported by the SSP are tackling the government floor targets although the recent indices of deprivation show that Halton has worsened.  This is more to do with the measurement of the targets and is not a true reflection.

 

Neighbourhood Renewal Unit (NRU) monitor and measure the SSP to determine their success at achieving targets.

 

Monitoring

 

Quarterly returns are submitted.  Each funded project completes a form and the W&E SSP also have a monitoring group who visit the project to follow progress.  Project leaders are also invited to the SSP meetings to outline their projects.  The LSP are given a report on the projects.

 

Engagement

 

w         CEN

w         Consultations / needs analysis

w         Area forums / PAD meetings

w         Conferences

w         Website

w         Grassroots development on 4 estates

w         YMCA have been funded to buy a building for outreach

 

Questions

 

w         Pauline outlined a trend that residents are moving out of the borough and questions have been raised regarding affordable housing.   The W&E SSP are looking at a project to purchase housing, to repair it and then to offer it for rent or purchase.  There was also a suggestion that a student could possibly study the reasons for why residents are choosing to move out of the borough.

 

w         If bids are not accepted, how is the money allocated?  The partners look at a piece of work that they believe is necessary to address one of the objectives and they then approach a provider they believe has a good track record to deliver the piece of work.

 

w         Who decides the membership of the SSP?  Each SSP is different.  Some groups have membership defined by the government but beyond this it is at the discretion of the SSP to invite new members.

 

w         How public is the information?  As much as possible will go onto the website.  It is only sensitive information which will not be included.

 

w         NRF funding – how was the decision made to allocate funding to the 5 SSP’s?  Each SSP were asked to prioritise their objectives and submit this report to the LSP.  It was then decided to allocate the funding on a balancing of needs basis.

 

w         Will Haltons position worsening on the indices of deprivation get more money for the borough?  Halton will receive more money next year but this is not because the index rating has worsened but rather because Halton has further to travel from their current position to the national floor targets.