Police Scotland have issued some guidance on staying safe and avoiding scams online and over the phone. 

Online Safety Leaflet TSI circulation Sept 2018

 

 

On Wednesday 5th September, Edinburgh Voluntary Organisations’ Council (EVOC) staff, including a very elderly black Labrador called Sally, will deliver ‘thank you cards’ to voluntary organisations across the city.

The team will broadcast their journey, in a series of live Twitter video streams and provide information and insights into the charities that will be featured. This event is part of a yearlong programme of activities and events to mark EVOC’s 150th Anniversary. During this time, EVOC has gone from providing poor relief and improving sanitation in Victorian Edinburgh to supporting charities, community and voluntary organisations to make life fairer for people from all walks of life.

 

Ahead of the event, EVOC was joined by Ben Macpherson MSP and Leith Walk Councillors, Susan Rae, Marion Donaldson and Amy Mcneese-Mechan at Volunteer Edinburgh to mark International Day of Charity.

Ben Macpherson MSP said: “Days like the International Day of Charity are good chance for all of us to recognise and celebrate the contribution that charities make and that the staff and volunteers who work for and campaign for charities make. The difference that they make to people, and the contribution that they make to building a fairer and more inclusive society and towards the shared aim of social justice.”

Uncovering a shared past

Many of the charities that will form part of the route, have their origins in EVOC and as part of uncovering Edinburgh’s rich heritage of benevolent organisations, the team will be uncovering and explaining these links.

Lucy Ridley, EVOC 150 Programme Manager, said: “EVOC has been supporting Edinburgh’s residents through its work with charities for 150 years. What a lot of people don’t know is that organisations such as Volunteer Edinburgh and the Edinburgh branch of Citizens Advice Bureau were originally projects within EVOC. This journey is a great way to recognise these special relationships, and also to thank the people in these organisations for the work they do.”

The journey will start at the EVOC offices on Ashley Place from 09:30am and the route will cover charities based in Leith, Stockbridge and the New Town.

Get Involved 

We would invite you to watch our journey by following us on Twitter at @evoc_edinburgh and using the hashtag #EVOC150.

More information about the EVOC 150th Anniversary project can be found at www.evoc150.org.uk

The EVOC 150 team has been busy working with a diverse range of groups and individuals to uncover and reflect on the importance of charity and voluntary organisations and the third sector as a whole, as part of a celebration of 150 years of EVOC. 

We approached Media Education’s weekly film club held in Dalry with the idea to deliver a workshop that explained the fascinating history of medical pioneer and suffragist, Elsie Inglis. The group then used archive materials, information and props to create two fantastic shorts films paying tribute to this historical figure. 

Wide Variety of Skills

Shaun Glowa from Media Education said: “Media Education runs a young persons Film Club every Friday, where we watch, discuss and make films. We run practical film making challenges every week so that participants can get stuck in right away. We aim to create a fun, creative and welcoming social space for young people with a wide variety of skills and abilities, including those with additional support needs.

“The workshop with EVOC went really well. It was a fantastic opportunity for the young people to learn about the amazing life of Elsie Inglis through using and developing their own skills. Alea, Yasmin and Lucy brought a wealth of knowledge and supported the young people to interpret Elsie’s amazing achievements and life into film. It was a great experience for the young people to try something new and test their skills in different ways.”

The Finished Films

Elsie Inglis Remembered: Features of the announcement of Elsie’s death and her funeral, attended by royalty. 

A Lesson for Elsie: Takes a comic spin on the thinking behind refusing treatment from a female doctor

The EVOC 150 team is always looking for opportunities to work with individuals, organisations and groups to strengthen and encourage participation of the third sector and its rich history. 

If you would like to get involved please email 150 Programme Manager, Lucy Ridley on lucy.ridley@evoc.org.uk

The Edinburgh Integration Joint Board (EIJB) 2019 Grants Programme is now open for applications. The deadline for submission is Monday 1 October 2018.

The full set of documents for download and completion is as follows:

First of all there is the Prospectus which outlines vital information about the grants programme.  This document should be read first and is available here: EIJB Grants Programme Prospectus

The Guidance document describes how to complete the application form and answer questions – essential reading: Applicants’ Guidance Notes

There are two grant programmes:

• The Small Grant Programme, for applications of under £25,000 per year – SMALL Application Form (digital)
• The Large Grant Programme, for applications of £25,000 or more per year – LARGE Application Form (digital)

Finally, information about the Standard Impact Assessment Questions – SIAQs – IJB Grant Programme 2019-22

A live Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) page is being maintained at this site (please check back regularly): https://trello.com/b/yb359m7A/edinburgh-ijb-grants-faqs

Information about contacts, websites, email address for submission etc can be found in the Prospectus and Guidance.

The launch of the new application process for the Employability Third Party Grants (formerly known as the Challenge Fund) will be on Monday 27 August.

An event will be held in the Business Centre of the City Chambers, starting at 2.30pm.

Information on the specification and how to apply will be provided, as well as a chance for providers to ask questions.

To sign up, please email craig.dutton@capitalcitypartnership.org.

 

Edinburgh Voluntary Organisations’ Council (EVOC) sits down with Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership’s Chief Officer, Judith Proctor, to ask about the importance of collaboration with the third sector and shifting the focus of investment towards prevention and early intervention.

The Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership is a public body set up to deliver the integration of adult health and social care services across the city. Its aim is to make sure that care and local services are delivered seamlessly, in a way that benefits service users and carers.

Q: You’ve been the Chief Officer at the Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership for 3 months now. What opportunities for improvement have you seen that you are going to promote?

A: “I would say that whilst there are areas we can definitely improve, there are lots of areas where we’re doing a lot of really good and innovate work. I would point to the work that we are doing with our Links Workers, I think they are really innovative in working alongside our primary care practitioners to help people access the community and hopefully have an impact on isolation and loneliness.

“There’s definitely some areas where our performance could improve. There’s a well-known challenge of discharging people from hospital, we have quite high numbers of people who are delayed.

“We are making some plans in that direction and also in terms of people who are waiting for assessment in the community and we are working with our third sector and independent sector providers to improve that.

“We want to improve the way that we work with neighbourhoods, communities and third and voluntary sector organisations as well, that’s really important.”

Q: There is a strong, and widely accepted, evidence base to support a substantial shift towards investment in prevention and early intervention. In a time of austerity, what ideas are beginning to surface so you can achieve this shift?

A: “In a time where finances are under challenge it can often be an area that is overlooked and where, I think, we need to invest in those real upstream prevention and early intervention programmes because we do know that they work.

“Our whole ethos in health and social care is to create that shift in the balance of care, so that we are able to deliver more services on a community basis, help keep people safe and well at home, and promote their wellbeing and their independence.

“Our plans really do talk to how we invest in and build community capacity, how we help build resilience within communities and those low level, very local services that support people.

“We will be looking at how we develop our hospital at home model and how we do signposting so that people are able to access those services in the community that enable them to be safe at home.”

Q: The Care Inspectorate’s last review of older people’s services showed that one of the areas for improvement was engagement with the third sector. How can this be taken forward?

A: “How we work in partnership with the third sector is really important. The Health and Social Care Partnership do provide some of our own services but we are an organisation of partnership and that includes partnership with the NHS, City of Edinburgh Council and the third sector.

“I do think that before I came here some improvements were happening, I think EVOC has been engaged with in terms of their membership on the Integration Joint Board (IJB). Now we are doing some work on co-chairing working groups and strategy groups with EVOC and really looking to see how we can involve colleagues to tap into the expertise, experience and innovation in that sector.

“We’ve got four localities in Edinburgh, which really should enable us to work very locally with third sector organisations. We need to ensure that we are able to support our heads of localities and their teams to do that work, I think it’s a really important area for us to develop.

“We involve and think about the third sector across everything we do in adult services. It’s really important that we’re engaging in things like how we prevent working with people in drug and alcohol services, as well as how we are supporting older people and those with disabilities to link into their community and be active citizens.

“We have had some really good engagement with colleagues in the third sector in terms of our Primary Care Improvement plan.”

Q: There is national dissatisfaction with the way procurement currently plays out for health and social care services. Cost and volume contracts and competitive tenders can risk the quality of outcomes and tend to disadvantage established, local community based organisations. How can we move away from the conservative procurement culture prevalent in Edinburgh to a more creative approach?

A: “We are bound as a public sector organisation to work within the confines of the appropriate guidance and regulations around procurement and commissioning but, I think within that, we do have scope to broaden to a more co productive approach with the third and independent sectors.

“We have developed the whole process of our grants review alongside colleagues within the sector and on the next iteration of our Care at Home contract we are looking to involve providers to see how we can work together as much as possible. It’s beyond procurement for me, it’s about the creation of a stable, vibrant, innovate market of high quality care in Edinburgh.”

Q: Reflecting on the third sector, what do you think are its main strengths and where could improvements be made?

“The ability to work at a very local level, and that can sometimes be challenging, given our previous conversation about procurement. Also, the ability to focus on particular areas, neighbours and issues for people enables the sector to be far more agile than we can in the public sector and often quite innovative and imaginative in their approach.”

“I think improvements could be made in how we support colleagues, and EVOC have been particularly good in this, and how we can promote more of a collaborative approach across the sector, which is difficult when finances are hard and there’s increasing competition.

“But if we can work together as partnerships, we are able to get a degree of the sustainability that we all look for as well as the agile, innovative approach. EVOC has a real role in this, but we need to think about how we can bring together organisations that are in competition to work in collaboration.

“Otherwise some of the improvements are ours to make in how we support and enable the workforce and what can do to ensure that small organisations are able to benefit from some of the economies of scale that big, public sector organisations can bring. We all have a role to play in how we develop the workforce here in Edinburgh, and I think they are a really valuable commodity.”

 

By Alea Ibrahim, Communications Intern for EVOC 150 Heritage Programme

The EVOC150 team seized the uncharacteristically tropical Edinburgh weather last Friday and visited Social in the Gardens, organised by Edinburgh Social Enterprise.

Locals and people from all over the world enjoyed family activities and a jam-packed entertainment programme of Highland dancing, storytelling and music until late in the evening. Social enterprises are set up like other businesses but use the profits to reinvest into causes with a social impact. Some of Edinburgh’s social enterprises joined the event to showcase their work and volunteers from across the city were socialising with the visitors.

Cooking Classes with Cyrenians Good Food

Manning the Cyrenians stall Viki Fox, Cookery Tutor, of Cyrenians’ Good Food Programme said that since Prue Leith from the Great British Bake-Off opened the brand-new, purpose-built Good Food kitchen in Jane Street at the beginning of the year, they have had a busy programme.

Viki said: “We are teaching cooking classes funded by the council and we are doing evening classes for adults, the money made from that goes back into the service. We do kids classes during the summer holidays and there is a supper club for refugees trying to get a business going.” Cyrenians is currently celebrating their 50th anniversary of supporting Edinburgh’s vulnerable citizens with a large network of services.

Business Advice to Ice-Cream

Michelle Craig, from Citizens Advice Scotland attended the event to promote the organisation’s services, but also ended up giving some fairly unusual advice. She said: “Many were interested in advice and services on how to set up their own business but we give advice on anything really. Someone needed advice on where the nearest ice-cream was.”

Invisible Cities taking a stand

Invisible Cities trains homeless citizens as guides who create their own tours around the city while the organisation helps them back on their feet, into employment and housing.

Alice from Invisible Cities, explained how one of their trained guides had recently turned his situation around, she said: “ The guide and his son had been homeless and on benefits due to a range of unfortunate circumstances when they came to Invisible Cities but it was really important for him to come off benefits. He became a tour guide and recently started a new job as a chauffeur, he was working until 3 o’clock this morning before coming here. That’s dedication for you!”

In keeping with Edinburgh’s other festivals, this year’s Social in the Gardens had an international focus. Alice continued: “We receive inquiries from all over Europe, a lady from Australia approached us today and wants to do something similar there.”

A call for social justice

Edinburgh Social Enterprise has been organising this event since 2014 but this year has been a remarkable success with over 30 stalls and 160% more visitors than in previous years.

Chatting to people on the stalls reflects that while a lot of organisations are working to tackle social inequality, poverty and homelessness, the problems still prevail. Edinburgh Voluntary Organisations’ Council grew out of concern over the health and social inequalities between people in the city. Founded in 1868, it is now celebrating its 150th year.

EVOC150 is marking this year with a series of collaborations and events, to strengthen the third sector and continue the fight for social justice.

Follow our programme, find out how to be involved and spread the word. Twitter: @evoc_edinburgh and use the hashtag #EVOC150

As part of our celebration of 150 years of EVOC’s role in campaigning for social justice in Edinburgh, we are recruiting volunteers to help us deliver a range of activities and events.

Storyteller

We have opportunities for people to tell their story at events or in schools and to demonstrate the important and positive impact your experience of the third sector has had on your life. You’ll be an advocate and be encouraging and inspiring people to volunteer and consider the third sector as a valuable career.

For more information on the role and to apply click here.

Events and Evaluation Assistant

In this role you’ll be supporting the smooth running of events including staffing stalls, distributing questionnaires and conducting surveys with people. You’ll also be working to collect data and update digital records for evaluation purposes.

For more information on the role and to apply click here. 

Creative Contributors 

Creative Contributors will have the opportunity to attend events to capture images and creatively interpret resources according to areas of interest for example: photography, all forms of painting, drawing, poetry etc. In this role you will also contribute to the legacy of the project with opportunities for your work to be displayed publicly.

For more information about the role and to apply click here.

To find out more about EVOC’s 150 year heritage and what we’ve been doing to celebrate, visit the EVOC 150 site here – https://www.evoc150.org.uk/ 

Tweet us at @evoc_edinburgh and use #EVOC150

Edinburgh Voluntary Organisations’ Council (EVOC) has launched its ‘Memory Box’ project at the Living Memory Association as part of celebrations to mark 150 years of civic action in Edinburgh.

From today (4th July 2018) people will be able to write down and submit their memories of campaigning, volunteering and protesting and post them into a physical box.

The Memory Box and collaboration with the Living Memory Association is part the EVOC 150 programme, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Lucy Ridley, Programme Manager for EVOC 150: “The EVOC 150 project is a celebration of civic action in Edinburgh through the delivery of all sorts of different interactive activities.

“As part of this, we are working in partnership with the Living Memory Association and they have already begun looking at archive material from our heritage and making these accessible. The next phase of their work is to investigate who the people in the photos are and what the story is. From there, they will help us create a rich oral history of EVOC for future generations.

“We would welcome people to submit a memory, a short story or poem about their memories of voluntary and civic action in Edinburgh. Our job will then be to interpret them and communicate them with the wider community.”

The Chance to Reflect

The Living Memory Association, located at Ocean Terminal, provides a range of services aimed at giving people the opportunity to reflect and reminisce on the past.

Miles Tubb, Project Worker at the Living Memory Association, said: “We are a reminiscence oral history project, we’ve been going for 32 years and we work largely with older people using reminiscence to get people more socially active.

“I think the EVOC 150 Memory Box is a great idea because people in here like to share memories. They are not just picking things up but they are also giving information. The fact that we can put a box out there specifically about protest and campaigning is great, people like to contribute and that’s what we are about.

“I think to reminisce is a basic human instinct and it’s nothing to do with age, young children reminisce and it’s surprising how it brings people together.”

The EVOC Memory Box will be available during Living Memory Association opening hours, people can also submit their memories online here.

                                                                          

The Scottish Government has launched a new website to provide a free and accessible source of guidance to all suppliers interested in bidding for any Scottish goods, services or health and social care public contracts.

The ‘Supplier Journey’ site was created in response to a survey commissioned by the Scottish Government which asked public, private and third sector suppliers about what support they needed. The survey drew in over two and a half thousand responses which informed the look and feel of the new website.

The site is set out as a series of chronological links guiding suppliers through the whole process from preparing and analysing your organisation to reflecting on the lessons learned.

The stages are: Prepare, Bid, Decision and Award, Contract Management and Lessons Learned.

Because the site can be used by organisations to bid or re-bid for public contracts, it will be patricianly useful for Third Sector, voluntary and charity organisations looking to secure Health and Social Care contracts.

A spokesperson for the Scottish Government said: “The aim of the Supplier Journey is to provide a consistent source of procurement information to all Scottish suppliers which is free to use and easily accessible.  The guidance contained can be used by suppliers from all sectors and will be updated over time.

The site also offers guidance on where to look for contracts, such as the Public Contracts Scotland website where organisations can gain free access to details of contracts with public bodies, local authorities and the Scottish Government.

The website also includes a glossary of terms commonly used in the procurement process, to make bidding for contracts accessible for all organisations such as small and medium sized businesses and third sector organisations. 

For more information follow the links in the article of visit the website at: https://www.supplierjourney.scot/ 

Are you a Third Sector organisation that is using the Supplier Journey? Have a comment to make? Get in Touch at comms@evoc.org.uk