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THE BRISTOL COMPACT (FINAL DRAFT)

The Bristol Compact aims to create a new approach to partnership working between statutory agencies in Bristol and the voluntary and community sector. It aims to provide a framework to facilitate co-operation and new ways of working between organisations. Statutory agencies and voluntary and community organisations share many aims including the pursuit of inclusiveness, dedication to public life and the support for the development of healthy communities. The Compact is a starting point for developing this partnership, based on shared values and mutual respect. It includes sections on funding, volunteering, information and consultation, and working with Equalities Communities. Issues of Equalities will underpin the whole agreement.

 

The Compact has been developed by the members of the Bristol Partnership and marks a joint commitment by the major public agencies and the voluntary and community sector to value and enhance their relationship. Its operation and effectiveness will be reviewed annually and positive and negative examples of partnership working will be highlighted.

 

The shared principles underpinning this Compact are:

  • Voluntary action is an essential component of a democratic society.
  • An independent and diverse voluntary and community sector is fundamental to the well-being of society.
  • In the development of public service statutory agencies, the community and the voluntary sector have distinct but complementary roles.
  • Working in partnership towards common aims and objectives means we can achieve more. Meaningful consultation builds relationships, improves policy development, and enhances the design and delivery of services and programmes.
  • Statutory agencies and the community and voluntary sector have different forms of accountability and are answerable to a different range of stakeholders. Common to both is the need for integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership.
  • The statutory sector and the voluntary and community sector acknowledge the importance of promoting equality of opportunity for all people regardless of race, age, impairment, gender, sexual orientation, or religion and issues of equality will underpin the implementation of the Compact.

In order to support agencies and groups to implement this Compact, a set of Compact guidelines are being produced. The guidelines describe actions and give examples - these will make the Compact a practical tool in supporting positive relationships and work between local groups and agencies.

FUNDING, CONTRACTING AND INVESTMENT

Many voluntary and community organisations in Bristol feel positive about the relationship between themselves and their funders. The Compact will build on existing good practice and aims to create more consistency in funding processes between agencies in the City. It will cover grants, service level agreements and commissioning and will clarify the differences between these processes.

It is accepted that long-term funding agreements are beneficial for both funders and funded organisations. Funding agreements will be for as long as practicable and an appropriate length of time will be agreed for each project to include short-term project funding and feasibility work as well as on-going funding.

Wherever possible the partners to the Compact are committed to introducing co-ordinated funding processes with:

  • common forms,
  • model agreements,
  • information sharing,
  • clear open baseline standards,
  • joint monitoring,
  • integrated timescales for funding systems and
  • agreed notice periods for the withdrawal of funding.

It is agreed to set up a Joint Funding Working Group to address these issues. This will report to the Bristol Partnership by December 2003.

Monitoring

The Compact commits itself to establishing good practice in relation to accountability and monitoring of financial support to the voluntary and community sector. It aims to adopt this standard by all sections within the City Council and other partners to the Compact by December 2003. This approach is intended to minimise the burden of monitoring on voluntary and community organisations, whilst maintaining proper accountability. This will include a commitment to shared monitoring and evaluation processes, including the identification of a lead funder and an agreement that assessments of an organisation by one agency are accepted by others. It will also give an agreement to user evaluation of funding processes.

The partners to the Compact will work to establish a unified Bristol Small Grants Pot for grants up to £10,000 with a single application process and monitoring procedures by April 2004. This will follow the model of the Government Office South West's Small Grants Action Plan.

Agencies provide support to voluntary and community organisations through a number of other resources, including secondment of staff and management support, free or low cost access to community buildings, sharing of other resources (eg computers and vehicles), training, community development and fundraising support (eg Funderfinder). These are acknowledged as important benefits which demonstrate the extent of mutual support which already exists. It is noted that community and voluntary sector groups also provide their knowledge, skills and resources to statutory agencies.

A commitment is given to set out a series of best practice standards when acting as a landlord to voluntary and community sector organisations by December 2003.

EQUALITIES

The Compact gives a commitment to improve relationships between the Bristol Partnership's members and disadvantaged communities in the City. This includes work with:

  • Black and Minority Ethnic Communities
  • Children and Young People
  • Disabled People
  • Gay, Bisexual and Lesbian Communities
  • Older People
  • Women

The Compact also aims to support other groups who may be particularly disadvantaged for instance:

  • Ex-Offenders
  • Faith Communities
  • Homeless People
  • People living in some economically disadvantaged parts of the city
  • People with Drug or Alcohol Issues
  • People with Mental Health Problems
  • Refugees and Asylum Seekers
  • Single Parents
  • Travellers
  • Vulnerable People

It is acknowledged that the voluntary and community organisations working with these equalities groups have an important role in helping to achieve the Compact's aims. These organisations:

  • empower users through involvement in the design and delivery of services
  • advocate for community needs
  • alleviate poverty
  • improve the quality of life
  • actively involve some of the most socially excluded people and communities in the City
  • contribute to Bristol as a dynamic and vibrant place.

Equalities organisations experience many of the same constraints as mainstream voluntary and community organisations, but more acutely. They also face specific constraints as they are a less well-developed sector and can suffer discrimination and disadvantage. There is evidence that these groups and communities may be excluded from some existing funding processes or traditional methods of consultation and participation.

The Bristol Compact will make a commitment to consider and address the needs and issues raised by them and to implementing the legal requirements of the Race Relations Act 1975 (as amended in 2000), the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, the Sex Discrimination Act 1975 and the Human Rights Act 2000. The monitoring of the Compact will focus on equalities issues in each of its sections.

CONSULTATION, INFORMATION AND PARTICIPATION

There are a number of reasons why statutory agencies and community and voluntary sector organisations will want to communicate with each other.
These include:

  • Information giving
  • Information gathering
  • To consult about matters which are open to change
  • To hold ongoing discussions about a range of issues and developments.

Before starting any communication with external bodies public agencies will clearly identify:

  • The purpose of the communication - what is to be achieved?
  • Who do we talk to and why?
  • How do we appropriately communicate with those targeted?

Information and consultation activities must be accessible to smaller groups and those most affected by the issues. Appropriate methods must be used to reach those most likely to be excluded by traditional communication methods. Consultation will require a range of methods to engage different groups of people and communities.

Agencies will plan communication in advance and contact others to find out if it is possible to bring different consultation processes together, especially where these are to be locally held.

In the past we have not always been clear about the reason we are communicating, calling a range of activity "consultation" regardless of whether what is being discussed is open to change or not. This can lead to confusion. It may even lead to anger and resentment among those who join in to give a view and make changes to proposals and plans that find they are simply receiving information.

In future, those signing this Compact will give a clear explanation of the purpose of communicating in relation to:

  • Information giving - information will be clear, concise, and in plain English. It will be made available in different formats and languages as appropriate.
  • Information gathering - agencies will gather general and specific information to give an informed base to planning services, usually before any consultation or ongoing evaluation purposes.
  • Consultation - only processes allowing those specific matters open to genuine change that reflect expressed views will be described as consultation. There are many ways to consult, and these are described more fully in the implementation guidance. However, for written consultations it should be a matter of good practice to allow 12 weeks for replies in order to accommodate the work cycles of community and voluntary organisations and political/organisational processes in statutory agencies.
  • Dialogue - statutory agencies, community groups and voluntary organisations will find it useful to have ongoing discussions for planning and development purposes. Such dialogue may not have set deadlines, and may take a number of forms. Some of these are described in the implementation guidance.
  • Costs of participation - statutory agencies recognise that participation in their consultation programmes and ongoing dialogue about plans and developments requires resources. These include time and costs of travel and childcare, personal assistance, and interpreters.

VOLUNTEERING

Volunteering has been described as "an important expression of citizenship and essential to democracy. It is the commitment of time and energy for the benefit of society and the community and can take many forms. It is undertaken freely and by choice without concern for financial gain." The Home Office 2000.

The 4 principles that are fundamental to volunteering are:

  • Choice. It must be freely chosen without any form of coercion or compulsion and should not be used to replace paid staff.
  • Diversity. Volunteering should be open to all, no matter what their background, age, race, sexual orientation, faith, disability or gender.
  • Reciprocity. In exchange for their time and skills the volunteer should receive benefits from the activity and receive any legitimate expenses resulting from their volunteering. Benefits can include a sense of achievement, useful skills, experience and contacts, sociability and fun.
  • Recognition. Explicit recognition of the value of volunteering to the organisation, to the community, to the social economy and to wider social objectives.

DISPUTE RESOLUTION

Voluntary and community organisations and statutory agencies in Bristol generally work well together. The diversity of these partnerships is clearly a strength. This said, there will inevitably be occasional tensions between these bodies. It is how we deal with these tensions or conflicts that is important. The principles used to resolve disputes that may arise will be to:

  • Promote good practice in conflict resolution and seek to use processes, which find real resolutions to the issues, using local mediation resources.
  • Recognise and support the independence of the voluntary and community sector, including the right within the law to campaign, to comment on statutory agency policy and to challenge that policy, irrespective of any funding arrangement that might exist and to determine and manage its own affairs.
  • Develop a willingness to work collaboratively recognising that compromise may be necessary at times.
  • Develop a clear view of the roles and responsibilities of elected members.