Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) Project
Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) Project
This project has now finished. If you want to find out more please contact Ruth Pitter or Sophie Bayley on 0117 909 9949.
" It really hit home - years of persecution. You get used to it; it's only when you go to training that you realise how bad it is" A Roma Gypsy after doing the 2 - day 'Confident to Present' training
Our Voices Count Event -report of event
Project update
Project overview
Project Details
What the project will do
Comments and feedback
Voscur's partners in this work
Documents and tools used
Images
EHRC projects in Bristol
Our Voices Count event
This event took place on Wednesday 25 February 2009
The event highlighted a year long Equalities and Human Rights project that explored key issues for Gypsy and Traveller communities, Somali women, Single parents, Teenage parents, Refugee women, and Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual communities.
It was a chance for people to hear voices from people who could inform your services and help you to improve your services for their communities. To download a report of the event Click Here
Project update
Voscur’s EHRC project is now finished! It equipped groups and communities with the skills and information to find ways in which equalities issues are better promoted to service providers and the wider community.
The groups and communities worked with with included:
Single/Lone Parents
Gypsies and Traveller communities
Somali women
Refugee women
Bristol Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Forum
Voluntary Sector organisations challenging hate crime
Boards and Trustees
Voluntary, community and social enterprise (vcse) sector reps
Local activists and agencies involved in Neighbourhood Partnerships
So far we have run successful events with Gypsy and Traveller communities and Single/Lone Parents where they discussed barriers and pathways to equality. We are gathering the information to take forward to an event in February for service providers and community groups to listen to what they have to say. As part of the process we provided a 2-day training course called ‘Confident to Present’ with Gypsy and Traveller communities.
Since receiving the training attendees from the 'Confident to Present' course gave a presentation on housing, education and the prejudice they receive to Voscur staff. Staff felt it was really insightful and the presenters felt that they had been given all the tools to present effectively and are keen to give more presentations to other groups.
From the single/lone parents' event, the parents highlighted the need to be more engaged with housing providers. Therefore Voscur is setting up a visit to a housing association for single/lone parent which will take place on 26 January.
We have now finished working with Hannah More School and carired out 6 sessions for Somali women on Confident to Present. The women were able to deliver a workshop to 30 staff at the school and everyone felt it was a success.
The Teenage Parent Project in Hartcliffe received a Boards Without Barriers session for their board members and staff . The session was really valuable and the parents on the board felt they got lots out of it and are have an action plan to take the work forward to their organisation.
Part of our Confident to Present training to Refugee Women of Bristol Normal 0 has now been delivered and are looking forward to the second session in the new year.
We have met with LGB Forum to disccus organising a meeting focused around LGB and faith issues.
Our Voices Count Event took place on 25 Febraury- this event highlighted all issues that were raised by the groups who took part in this project.
A final report was sent to the Equalities and Human Rights Commission at the beginning of May.
Project overview
Voscur feels that it is essential to encourage activity and partnership working across equalities strands. Through our work in the equalities field we are aware that, even though organisations have a huge amount of knowledge, skills and expertise in their specific field, there are often gaps in awareness and understanding of other equalities communities.
Our project work delivered under priority area 1, ‘Encouraging good relations.’ to improve dialogue, integration and cohesion between equalities groups.
The project enabled us to create partnerships with groups and organisations to ensure we delivered in a way that brought real benefits to equalities communities and others.
What the project has achieved:
Equalities information and awareness training: we ran equalities training for VCSE reps who represent the sector at strategic levels; training on equalities good practice for people involved in Neighbourhood Partnerships, training on representation and inclusion for VCSE boards; and training in partnership with SARI, EACH (Educational Action Challenging Homophobia) and WECIL (West of England Centre for Inclusive Living) on Hate Crime awareness for the wider sector.
Facilitation skills and confidence building: we ran training for Somali women in partnership with Hannah More school to empower them to facilitate awareness and information sessions, and working in partnership with Bristol City Council Gypsy and Traveller team we will do similar training for Gypsy and Traveller adults so they are empowered to voice issues to service providers.
Working with other communities: we run an event for lone parents in partnership with Single Parent Action Network called ‘Barriers to moving forward’ and will form partnerships with the Bristol Lesbian, Gay and Bi-sexual Forum and Refugee Women of Bristol around gathering information about the barriers communities face and how service providers could transform their practices to eliminate barriers and achieve equality and fairness.
Comments and feedback
Some feedback from 'Confident to Present':
" It really hit home - years of persecution. You get used to it; it's only when you go to training that you realise how bad it is"
"Brilliant two days - learnt so much"
"Brilliant 2 day sessions of training (very useful)".
"Just a big thank you to Sophie and Ruth for putting their hard work to good use".
"I felt very welcomed, also felt part of the group".
"Great experience"
"Sophie and Ruth you ran the sessions brilliantly and you made everyone feel very relaxed".
Some feedback from single/lone parent event:
"Really good to network with single parents"
"Positive!!"
"Good stuff. Would be great to get together again with other such trained up groups".
Our partners in this work
SARI (Support against Racist Incidents) – Hate Crime training
EACH (Educational Action Challenging Homophobia) – Hate Crime training
WECIL (West of England Centre for Inclusive Living) – Hate Crime training
SPAN (Single Parent Action Network) – Scoping needs of single/ lone parents
Bristol LGB Forum – Equality awareness in schools
Gypsy and Traveller Team, Bristol City Council - Presentation skills training
Hannah More School – Presentation skills training for Somali women
Refugee Action – Presentation skills training for Somali women
Refugee Women of Bristol – an event for Refugee women
Safer Bristol Partnership – Hate Crime training
Documents and tools used
Invite for Somali parents in easy English
Single/ lone parents' event flyer
How to Make your talk interesting
How to deal with difficult audience members
Information on Gypsy and Traveller communities (summary)
Information on Gypsy and Traveller communitites (full document)
Equalities Legislation (summaries)
Training - Boards without Barriers
Boards without Barriers training session was designed for organisations that wanted to have a more diverse range of board members. If you would like to have a more inclusive board, then the documents below will be useful for you.
They are designed to help you consider how diverse your board currently is, how you could be more inclusive and cover an A-Z of ideas as well as a skills audit for board members. If you need any explanation on how to use them, please give Sophie Bayley or Ruth Pitter a call on 0117 909 9949
What does diversity mean for board members
Questionnaire on how you as a board member in a meeting
A-Z list of tips to be more inclusive
Skills Audit for board members
Images
Training for Gyspy and Traveller communities
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Event for Single/Lone Parents
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EHRC projects in Bristol
In spring the EHRC announced funding awards for groups to deliver on three priority areas: encouraging good relations, promoting equality and human rights and supporting the development of legal cases that help people get a fair deal.
Five Bristol organisations, Avon and Bristol Law Centre, SARI (Support Against Racist Incidents), Bristol Lesbian Gay and Bisexual Forum, CEMVO (Council for Ethnic Minority Voluntary Organisations) and Voscur were successful. Referring to the funding awards Nicola Brewer, Chief Executive of the EHRC says:
"This is about helping those organisations that make a real difference at local level. They have both the knowledge and expertise to bring real benefits to their local communities. Through our unique grants programme we can help ensure this good work continues. Support for these organisations is critical if we are to succeed in extending equality and fairness to all people in Britain."
