Last year Nottingham City Council had a real-term cut of around £60 million in its grant from the government.  This year the Council predicts the reduction in its budget for 2012/13 may be around £20 million.

As it did last year, Nottingham City Council is asking its citizens and partners for their views on which Council services they think are important and where they think savings could be made.

Your responses will help the Council again as it tries to meet the huge challenges that it faces due to the spending reductions which could have major implications for the services it provides for Nottingham citizens.

You may already have let Nottingham City Council know your views.  If you haven’t yet, there are still opportunities to do so:

Complete the on-line survey “Your City Your Services” on Nottingham City Council’s website before 25 November

www.mynottingham.gov.uk/yourcityyourservices

• Attend one of the following ‘drop-in’ sessions:

22 November, 7.30pm at Hyson Green Community Centre, Gregory Boulevard, Hyson Green, Nottingham, NG7 6EE

6 December, 6.30pm – 8.30pm at Chase Neighbourhood Centre, The Chase, St. Ann’s, Nottingham, NG3 4EZ.

• Attend one of Cllr Dave Liversidge’s fortnightly surgeries.  He is Portfolio Holder for Housing Strategy and Community Sector, and his surgeries provide a regular opportunity for voluntary and community sector organisations to raise awareness of their work and discuss issues. The Surgeries are held at Loxley House, on Station Street, on alternative Friday mornings from 9.30am to 12 noon. The next few surgery dates are 2 December, 16 December and 13 January 2012. To book an appointment, please contact Phil Hearn at Nottingham City Council Tel: 0115 8762183 or E-mail: phil.hearn@nottinghmacity.gov.uk

 Please take the opportunity to have your say!

• Shelter opens 28^th November 2011.
• Shelter closes on the morning of 12^th March 2012.
• Shelter is located consecutively at St Peter’s, Radford. Thomas Helwys, Lenton. St Saviours in the Meadows and St Christopher’s in Sneinton (TBC).
• 20 beds overall are available for men and women who are over 18, with or without support needs, with or without a recourse to public funds, with or without a local connection to Nottingham City.
• A minimum of 6 beds will be allocated to those with recourse to public funds. 3 of these beds are for people with a Nottingham City connection. If these bed spaces are not allocated by the end of the referral period then they will be filled by people who don’t have a local connection, on a ‘one night only’ basis.
• No dogs allowed.
• A bed consists of an inflatable mattress on a church hall floor, which includes bedding and toiletries, a simple supper and breakfast.
• The project is staffed by three workers in the evening and two overnight.
• Everyone wishing to be referred to the Winter Shelter will need to turn up in person at Emmanuel House between 11-1 each weekday. After their initial night’s stay, people then needing subsequent nights will be re-referred into the night shelter before they leave each morning.
• The Project Leader is Eric Revill, Contact no; 07540590307 email: Nottinghamwintershelter@yahoo.co.uk

The Service User Advisory Group ( SUAG) consists of Framework service users, ex-service users and members of the Board.  The purpose of the group is to ensure that the board hears directly from the people that Framework supports.  SUAG members provide feedback from other service users about their experience of using Framework, what is done well and where services can be improved.  The group meets at least once every three months.

There are currently four SUAG members; John, Ursula, Kevin and Sybil.  SEA will soon be providing training to recruit some more members.

What was the purpose of the visits?

 Service users have a good understanding of the projects from which they receive support.  Framework however is a large organisation providing a wide range of services.  The SUAG members felt that it would be beneficial for them to widen their understanding and knowledge of what Framework does outside of their own service group.  This would enable them to represent other service users better.  Helen Sills is a relatively new member of the Board at Framework and currently chairs the SUAG meetings.  Helen felt that visiting services would be a great way to get to know the SUAG members, as well as increasing her own knowledge of the work Framework does.

The SUAG members and Helen met together with SEA to discuss which services they would be interested in visiting.  Time constraints meant that they could not visit them all!  In the end they decided on E.V.E, Waterloo Crescent, Noelle House, Elizabeth House, London Road, Potter Street, Bassetlaw TST & One Stop Shop, Ollerton Energy Village and Sherwood Street.  This would hopefully give a good representation of the work that Framework does.  A day was dedicated to the city services and another to the county.

Comments from the SUAG on the visits

 ‘The impression I got from the services we visited is that the staff are highly committed to providing a top notch service, this is fantastic, especially given the current uncertainty around cuts to services.

Prior to the visits my knowledge of Framework was limited to the service I had accessed. I now feel that I have a clearer understanding of the variety of services that Framework run within Nottingham City and County.

As someone who has accessed Framework, you hear things on the grapevine about different services and visiting the services allowed me to see firsthand what the services offer and it was great to hear from staff and service users. 

Thank you to everyone who helped us feel very welcome.’

 ‘I thought that the staff who we met on our visits were really dedicated.  That’s amazing.  They don’t just give you a home.  However I am still a little bit unclear about Target and Solutions.’

 ‘I am not aware whether apart from leaflets (like we were given at Sherwood Street) service users are given clear information about what each service provides. I was particularly struck at the energy village and also at Bassetlaw TST and one stop shop that there is inevitably a blurring of boundaries when it comes to ‘who does what.’ At Ollerton the similarity of names seemed a pity. However I also feel that in such a diverse service as Floating Support clear boundaries are not always possible. I would be interested to know whether service users have found this to be an issue and if so what suggestions they have about improving information. We are back to the ever present area of communication and getting the balance right between overload and clarity.

In terms of the services visited, I think there are accommodation suitability issues at Waterloo Crescent, concerns about internet access which seems to vary enormously and how the charity responds to the shifting sands of service cuts, especially at Sherwood street where the new service has been landed with dealing with no move on units.

Overall (I shall feed this back to the board) I was immensely impressed with staff’s ability to ‘get on with the job’ in these difficult times. I always feel that without a specific ‘job’ to do it is hard to get a service users perspective when visiting services. The very confidential nature of the services makes any meaningful personal contact impossible in such a short time.’

‘The SUAG has visited various branches in the City as well as those in the County.  The Framework Board and management can be in no doubt that the services are run by very caring, intelligent and wonderfully nice and decent people.  The team leaders could be held up as heroes.  Although the financial constraints are being felt, they still manage to inspire their teams to new levels of service and commitment despite the sword of Damocles hanging over everybody.  As regards whether or not, by the time April comes in and the 2^nd round of cuts start to bite again.

I’ve been very impressed by the services we’ve seen.  I had concerns about morale and how it would impact on clients, the staff seem to have adopted a ‘Fete accompli’ attitude whilst I’m working, I’ll give the best I can.  That’s the impression I came away with.

Perhaps something can be done to end all the speculation and get a definitive answer for the members of staff, so it doesn’t give the impression, to staff, that their not in a position, of the band playing on the deck, of the sinking ‘Titanic’.

I thought that is was really useful to visit these services.  It was good to see how each project does things.  It was a shame that we did not get to meet many service users though.  I would be keen to do some more visits again in the future.

Visiting the E.V.E service:  From front right – Kevin (SUAG), Zoe (SEA), Helen (Board), Ursula (SUAG), John (SUAG), Sybil (SUAG)

Conclusion

All of the SUAG members felt that they got a lot out of the two days.  Visiting a wide range of Framework projects really increased their knowledge of the work that Framework does.  Everyone commented on the excellent moral of the staff they met, this especially stood out considering the difficult changes that have taken place in Framework due to the cuts.  The SUAG felt that the staff they met were inspiring.

The SUAG said that they did not meet as many service users as they would have liked.  They were keen to hear from them about the service they receive from Framework.  However it was recognised that this can be difficult in many projects.

Thank you

SEA and the SUAG would like to say a big thank you to the staff who showed us around their service and answered the many questions they had.  They would like to extend a special thank you to Carl and Peter at Waterloo for such an enlightening visit.

The minutes from the last meeting are available below:

Minutes of Client Commission Meeting 12 August 2011.