Third Sector Partnership Assembly

Tel: (01925) 444070

Email: rharris@warrington.gov.uk

Purpose of the Third Sector Partnership Assembly

The Third Sector Partnership Assembly aims to bring together voluntary and statutory agencies in partnership to develop and promote a thriving, effective and influential third sector that will work to improve the quality of life for the people of Warrington.

The terms of reference detail the full purpose and role of the Third Sector Partnership Assembly.

Past Events:

18th July 2011, Alford Hall, Warrington

The Spring/Summer 2011 Third Sector Assembly took place on the 18th July at Alford Hall, a venue regularly used by a number of community and voluntary groups .

The day began with an introduction from the new Chair of the Warrington Partnership, Cllr Mike Hannon who gave a brief overview of the direction of the new administration. Then following feedback and requests from the Autumn Assembly in November 2010 updates were provided from senior managers from Warrington Borough Council's Neighbourhood & Community Directorate.

An interesting Third Sector perspective on the government's Localism policy and the need to build social capital was provided by Steve Cullen on behalf of the Third Sector Network Hub.

Rick Howell, Service Manager for Performance & Commissioning in Children & Young People's Services from Warrington Borough Council then gave a quick 10 minute update on Children's Commissioning with Chris Luke from the Council's Corporate Procurement Team providing delegates with information about a new 'one stop shop' for accessing information on available tenders with the Council, which will simplify the process for those organisations who are interested. Feedback suggests that people found this very useful and slides from this presentation can be viewed here. If anyone would like more information on this, please contact the team.

The afternoon gave everyone the opportunity to take part in a choice of workshops. The Funding workshop which has proven so popular in the past, again proved to be extremely popular. For those organisations interested in applying for contracts with the Council, there was a choice from two different workshops - 'Winning the Business' and 'An Introduction to Commissioning and Getting Ready to be Commissioned'. The first was aimed at those with very little knowledge of procurement processes and the second was for those organisations with some knowledge of the commissioning process but perhaps wanted some more in-depth advice. Again feedback suggests that these workshops were very useful.

As always, with such a large and diverse audience (which is the nature of the sector), it is difficult to provide topics which appeal to everyone throughout the day. Feedback was plentiful and suggests that everyone gained something useful from the event.

Although facilitated by the Third Sector Partnership Team, the Assembly is an event for the Third Sector and we need the input of the sector to ensure that you get out of it what you want and so we encourage delegates to let us know what they want to see included on the programme for the day. The next Assembly will take place in November/December 2011 so let us know your views and ideas by contacting the team.

To view the programme for the event, please click here.

To view the presentation from the whole of the event, please click here.

10th November 2010, Alford Hall, Warrington

The fourth Third Sector Partnership Assembly took place on the 10th November 2010, for the third time at Alford Hall in Warrington.  The event attracted over 80 delegates from the third sector and public sector who were interested in learning more about how the sectors can work together to reduce health inequalities in Warrington.

The format of the day included a presentation from Adam Pickering from the national organisation Compact Voice, which supports the Compact, the document which provides voluntary guidelines on how the public sector and the third sector should work together in partnership.

Everyone had the opportunity to get involved in a workshop which looked at how soft and hard outcomes could be achieved in helping the close the gap in health inequality in Warrington.  Feed back from these workshops will be available on this site shortly, along with the presentations from the day.

19th May 2010, Alford Hall, Warrington

The third Third Sector Partnership Assembly took place on the 19th May 2010, again at Alford Hall in Warrington.  The event again enjoyed a good turn out with around 80 people from the third and public sectors coming together to learn and share their knowledge and experience.

The format for this Assembly was more interactive and delegates were able to get involved in a choice of 4 different workshops and listened to presentations from Joe Blott (Executive Director Neighbourhoods & Community Services) and Jeff Scales from the Development Trust Association.  Slides for these presentations can be found here.