The response to coronavirus (COVID-19) has demonstrated the contribution that communities make to public health. Community life is essential for health and wellbeing, and we are all more aware of the value of social connections, neighbourliness, sense of belonging, control, and mutual trust.
This blog discusses the roles and activities of communities following the outbreak of COVID-19, and their resilience in the face of new challenges posed by this pandemic.
Community action
Since the outbreak of COVID-19, communities have sprung into action. Neighbours are connecting and looking out for each other more than usual, informal support groups in local areas have organised to support people in need, and now there are over 2000 groups listed on the mutual aid website established during the pandemic.
Solidarity is felt in communities across the world towards those who are helping us all. Many people have stepped forward as formal volunteers; in the NHS, community hubs and local charities.
ONS weekly research into social impacts of COVID-19 has seen a steady increase in community spirit over recent weeks;
nearly two thirds of adults (64.1%) saying other local community members would support them if they needed help during the pandemic (up from 57% previous week)
three in four adults (77.9%) saying they thought people are doing more to help others since the pandemic (up from 67.9% previous week)
nearly two in three adults (62.6) had checked in on neighbours who might need help at least once in the last seven days (up from 53.8% previous week)
over one in three adults (37.5%) had gone shopping or done other tasks for neighbours (up from 27.7% the previous week)
Ensuring no one is left behind
Communities have shown and built their resilience over recent weeks, but extra support is needed to support the seldom heard, isolated and excluded individuals and communities. Not everyone can contribute to or benefit equally from neighbourhood action, and those that are already disadvantaged may find it challenging to maintain resilience and participate in social networks in the face of the outbreak. Volunteer and community organisations play a valuable role here.
The role of the voluntary and community sector (VCS)
The VCS has always been a key player in the public health system, and this is even more evident in the current situation. They are often closer to and better at connecting with marginalised groups than other sectors and are ideally placed to implement more community-centred approaches. Their role in reducing health inequalities is essential. National charities and larger VCS organisations support the vital work of local organisations by helping to co-ordinate efforts across the sector.
Community resilience
Having a strong community infrastructure and supportive social networks are factors that help communities withstand and adapt to shocks. The importance of community resilience during emergencies is recognised nationally and internationally. The UK Community Resilience Development Framework sets out actions for Local Resilience Forums to ensure communities are central to response and recovery. These include identifying local community networks and assessing differing needs, supporting community-led social action and working alongside VCS partners.
International guidelines from the Global Inter-Agency Standing Committee offer further recommendations on the role of organisations in facilitating the conditions for community mobilisation, self-help and social support.
Many factors impact on a community’s ability to be resilient and thrive. The World Health Organisation recommends measuring community resilience by considering the different social, human, cultural, environmental and economic capacities.
Strengthening communities – the role of public health
Understanding community needs and strengths and building local action are part of the public health response and can help build resilience.
We know from our research that it is essential to facilitate the conditions for communities to thrive. This includes:
the role of community development, especially in marginalised communities, in order to increase people’s control over their health and wellbeing;
having a strong and co-ordinated voluntary & community sector, reaching out to those in need through responsive and innovative ways;
ensuring basic needs are met through employment, housing, food, income, natural environment and education, as prerequisites for community engagement and action;
maintaining two-way communication and decision-making between communities and organisations, to ensure needs and priorities are understood and addressed;
skilling the workforce in working with communities, using strengths-based approaches and coproduction;
utilising community-centred approaches to provide support and services, alongside professional-led services;
coordinating a place-based offer that is integrated across agencies and delivered at a small neighbourhood level.
Maintaining community resilience
The pandemic has not only highlighted the importance of communities but also investing in a community-centred public health system. In order not to lose these gains as we recover from the pandemic it is vital to maintain the centrality of communities and continue to strengthen community resilience through our ongoing efforts to improve the nation’s health and wellbeing.
PHE will be continuing its Healthy Communities work to support localities in taking a whole system approach to community-centred public health. We have a growing library of practice examples and welcome additions related to community-centred work during COVID-19. Communities everywhere are showing care, compassion and co-operation to get us through these difficult times. During this public health crisis, the voluntary and community sector and organisations who have responded so expertly and our thanks and recognition must go to them.
Some resources you may find helpful:
Thrive in Trying Times free online learning programme for community mobilisation and wellbeing during COVID-19 from FutureLearn.
Do you want to make a difference to health and care in Essex?
Healthwatch Essex is seeking a new CEO and up to three new Trustees to join its Board. Have you got what it takes to ensure that we are a thriving ‘independent voice for the people of Essex, helping to shape and improve local health and social care services’?
Click here for the role profiles and details of the application processes.
Ten million UK adults have been volunteering in their community during the coronavirus crisis, and most say they will carry on after the lockdown ends, according to new research.
The study also found that Britons have been extending a financial helping hand to local businesses. More than £1bn was spent on services and goods that people knew they would never be able to use during the pandemic, including payments to home cleaners and gardeners.
Since the crisis took hold, millions of Britons have been serving as an informal “volunteering army”, whether it is helping with grocery shopping for others, picking up prescriptions, ringing up people living alone, or helping out at a local food bank.
According to the research from insurer Legal & General and the Centre for Economics and Business Research, one in five UK adults (19%) has volunteered their time for community activities since the start of the lockdown on 23 March.
With each individual contributing, on average, about three hours of their time, the work this volunteer army is doing is estimated to have an equivalent economic value of more than £350m a week.
The researchers said “Britain’s community spirit has doubled down in lockdown” and that these volunteers were a key part of the “national infrastructure” during the crisis.
Nigel Wilson, Legal & General’s chief executive, said: “We have become a nation of volunteers during the Covid-19 crisis. And – judging by the millions who plan to continue after the lockdown – it is a change that is here to stay.”
Two-thirds of those who have volunteered (67%) have been doing grocery shopping for neighbours, friends and others, while a quarter (26%) have collected and delivered medicines or prescriptions. Meanwhile, 16% of those donating their time have volunteered to phone people who may be struggling with loneliness or other issues. This is all on top of the help being provided via the NHS volunteer programme launched on 24 March.
The research found that millennials – typically defined as those born between the early 1980s and the late 1990s or the start of the 2000s – were the least likely age group to volunteer, but that when they did, they gave up the most time: an average of 3.5 hours a week on grocery shopping, and 4.4 hours if volunteering in other ways.
Meanwhile, across all those surveyed, more than three-quarters (78%) said they planned to continue helping those in need after the lockdown.
The researchers also found that many households had tried to help those who help them, and were continuing to pay cleaners, gardeners and other workers for services they knew they would never be able to use under lockdown. An estimated £637m was spent on unused goods and services between the start of the lockdown and the end of April – a figure that has now risen to more than £1bn.
“The Youth Endowment Fund’s COVID-19 grant round will fund and evaluate work which supports vulnerable young people (predominantly aged 10 to 14) at risk of youth violence, and can be delivered whilst adhering to UK government social distancing and stay-at-home guidelines.”
As ECVYS, we don’t directly deliver youth work, but do try our hardest to support and enable the voluntary sector to be the best providers of youth work that they can be. The YEF has recently enabled lots of conversations about what the immediate future might look like in regards to youth work and how we can work together to provide a great offer of detached youth work across Essex, Southend and Thurrock.
Local youth organisations are key to communities and it would be amazing to work together to achieve the same outcomes through our detached work.
The PFCC and Active Essex have put some matched funding towards a bid for the voluntary sector if we can pull it together!….BUT we don’t have long at all!
We are looking for organisations who would like to work with us on a bid to the YEF to fund detached youth work in each district of Essex (inc Southend and Thurrock) for one year. We would particularly like to hear from local groups who know their communities well and have some experience in detached youth work, with a capacity to offer the work already, AND who are in a position to commit to this imminently as the funding bid needs to be in by the 3rd June! (I know!)
A suggested outcome for this project would be-
To protect and support vulnerable young people in Essex aged 10-14 through detached youth work provision, delivered by locally based voluntary youth organisations.
Outputs-
Offering a safe environment with a trusted adult(s) for young people that may not currently have this in place due to Covid-19
Providing positive activities for young people to get involved with through a mix of detached sessions to suit young people’s needs i.e around physical activity/ mental health/ craft/ chill out and chat (all delivered in a safe way).
Encourage and support young people by growing their networks and showing that physical isolation does not have to mean they are socially isolated
Help ease the transition back into formal education and further youth work/ volunteering opportunities
If this is something that you know your organisation can confidently deliver then you can pop me an email to arrange a chat, but I would really like you to fill in the questions below as an expression of your interest and get them back to me by Monday 1st June at 12pm
Please let me know-
What is the name of your Organisation, contact details and aims and objectives?
What is your organisations background and experience with detached work?
If you don’t have much experience with detached work, please can you explain how you will make sure that your organisation is able to commit to this project?
We would like this funding to be allocated to locally based groups who have youth workers who know the area. Which district would you be most interested in covering? (You can say more than one District, but please explain why if you can.)
Why do you think that your organisation will be the best one to deliver this in your district?
How would you be able to deliver detached work safely, and what approach would you take to the work?
Would you be able to commit to allocating a district based detached worker for 18hrs a week, for a year if we allocate your organisation £25,000? Please also provide costings totalling £25,000 showing 8hrs face to face work, 10hrs planning or support and other cost such as mileage, office costs, supervision costs etc.
Are you in a financial position to commit to taking on this project for a year?
Do you have the correct insurance to run this work? (i.e public liability of 10 million?)
Any other comments or information that you feel may be useful?
(Please note that this project is not designed to increase the size of your organisation, it would be ideally used by voluntary youth organisations who are looking to reassign centre based youth workers that can no longer work in their centres due to Covid-19. We do hope that strong links can also be formed with local schools so that when the bad weather hits you can transfer safely some detached work into school buildings or your youth centres. )
Our Trustees are really committed to make this happen and would love to see the YEF fund utilised by our local voluntary groups. I hope you think this is a good idea too, and hopefully will give us the chance to show off the fact that the voluntary sector in Essex is amazing and can achieve some great work together. Our Trustees will discuss on Wednesday afternoon any expressions of interest from organisations (who will have emailed me the answers to the questions above. I will then let you know on Tuesday 2nd June who we feel can best meet the criteria and work with us in the YEF bid…From there I will apply to the fund and wait to hear from the YEF with baited breath!
This is a great opportunity to pull groups together and support young people across Essex who may be feeling slightly lost and alone at this time, and I hope you will be as excited as we are to take this forward.
Thank you so much for your time,
Rachel Brett CEO: Essex Council for Voluntary Youth Services (ECVYS) [email protected]
Elaine McCorriston has sent an email explaining that she will be leaving Social Enterprise East of England (SEEE) at the end of May 2020:
After 8 years at SEEE I am moving on at the end of this month. I have enjoyed seeing the social enteprise sector grow, flourish and diversify during this time. SEEE has really demonstrated it staying power and determination to maintain a focal point for the sector in the East.
I would like to say a huge thank you for your support during this time as well as a big thank you to SEEE’s board for their passion and ongoing encouragement and kindness.
Jane Thompson has been appointed to take SEEE forward with the support of SEEE’s board and she will be taking over the [email protected] mailbox. Jane’s background is in marketing and this expertise will be a real asset as she produces SEEE Express, maintains the website and social media channels as well as organise and promote SEEE’s webinars.
Nicky Stevenson [email protected] will be leading on the consultancy service that SEEE offers and Andy Brady [email protected] will be leading on much of the strategic elements of SEEE as Chair. SEEE’s newest board member Magda Partac [email protected] will be looking after SEEE’s finances.
It has been a pleasure and I wish you and your organisation every success for the future.
St Clare Hospice have launched a new online community for bereaved young people in West Essex and East Hertfordshire: the Youth Bereavement Café (YBC). The ‘YBC’ is currently being run within a Facebook group, to offer a virtual space for young people (aged 18-30) to meet and connect with others who may share similar experiences – but will open as a face-to-face service when it is safe to do so.
A third of people who have supported a charity during lockdown have donated more money than usual while 15% are volunteering more of their time, according to a report from Opinium.
The report, How do charities adapt to the impact of Covid-19, looks at how consumers are supporting charities at this time, and includes a number of positive stories from the public as to what is making them increase their support now, and what would make them show support in the future, including:
Need for ongoing digital campaigns
Use of celebrity endorsements
Effectiveness of individual fundraising
Not to expect too much money
Maintaining the sense of belonging and community spirit
The UK’s largest bereavement charity, Cruse Bereavement Care, has launched a new training webinar for employers to support employees through bereavement. They have transformed their long-standing Loss and Bereavement workshop, into a new 2 hour interactive webinar which can be tailored to the needs of each organisation and will help attendees gain an understanding of grief and bereavement, become aware of the impact of loss, communicate with bereaved employees and develop an understanding of support organisations. Read more here.
The Coronavirus pandemic poses a serious challenge to the operations of charities of every type. That’s because the lockdown restrictions brought in to get the pandemic under control make charity fundraising very difficult indeed: charity shop networks are closed, and fundraising events have been cancelled. Digital fundraising, including virtual events, has become the only option for many charities, and that means service delivery activities will inevitably be impacted.
But the story gets worse – because normal service delivery channels are directly impacted by COVID-19 as well. With lockdown restrictions in place, it is all but impossible to deliver services face-to-face. And on top of this, many staff members have been furloughed or are working from home, meaning that charities have had to make drastic and sudden changes to the way they manage staff, teams, and projects.
ONLINE SERVICE DELIVERY
The good news is that many agile charities have been able to make rapid switches to online service delivery. For example, the National Childbirth Trust is now offering antenatal online courses to mums-to-be, St Barnabas Hospice has put together a digital bereavement guide, Shooting Star Children’s Hospices is providing online support groups via Zoom, and many other charities are offering telephone- or internet-based support sessions for individuals or groups.
INCREASED REACH
But there is more good news as well. There are signs that the sudden forced change to charity operations, and the move to online service delivery, may produce valuable benefits that will last long after the pandemic has ended.
For example, by moving to online channels for service delivery, and perhaps by adopting a different tone to suit the medium, some digital leaders have succeeded in reaching new audiences for their services. When things get back to a more normal footing it will be possible to go back to traditional service delivery channels, but also to retain this new online customer base.
Dingley’s Promise, a charity which supports under 5s with additional needs and disabilities, has ramped up its use of Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin and Instagram as well as print media and radio during the pandemic. “We have been forced to quickly shift to digital, remote support and information sharing and are finding that we can reach more people, and have an even bigger impact than before, said Catherine McLeod, the charity’s CEO, on Zoe Amar’s blog. “As such, we are likely to continue with a number of the online activities even after the end of lockdown,” she added.
STREAMLINED AND MORE FOCUSED
The difficulty of using traditional service delivery methods is having other impacts too. Some charities are being forced to take a long hard look at what they have been doing, and are returning to concentrating on their core activities. By looking at what the real needs are and working out how these can best be delivered during the pandemic, many of these are likely to emerge more streamlined and focused on meeting the needs of those they seek to help.
DIGITAL TOOLS FOR INCREASED EFFICIENCY
Charity staff are key to effective service delivery, and the move to home working means that many have had to become familiar very quickly with online tools such as Zoom, Slack, Miro, Monday, Trello, Asana and Microsoft Teams to communicate and work on projects together. Anecdotal evidence suggests that some – or even many – charity staff feel that communication has actually improved thanks to these tools.
At the very least, it’s true to say that most staff are now familiar with these and other online tools, and if their continued use improves operations and efficiency, speeds up digital transformation, and makes service delivery more effective in the long term, then that will be a big win for charities.
TIME FOR TRAINING
Some charity staff may find they have spare time on their hands thanks to the pandemic, perhaps because some of their normal activities are no longer possible, or maybe because they have been furloughed.
This type of training has the potential to result in a general upskilling of charity staff, which could result in more effective service delivery once the pandemic is over.
ENLARGED TALENT POOL
Finally, the fact that the COVID-19 pandemic has forced charity staff to work from home is likely to have a positive impact on service delivery long into the future for two important reasons.
Firstly, it means that valuable staff who move away, or potential hires with valuable skills who do not live locally, can still contribute to the charity: charity leaders should now have the confidence to allow flexible working because it has proven to be effective.
But perhaps more importantly, an acceptance of remote working means that charities themselves can change for the better. Since online trustee meetings are rapidly becoming the norm, that means that there is an immediate enlarging of the talent pool from which charities can draw for trustees.
“Being able to join board meetings virtually will open trustee opportunities up to a much wider range of people, such as those who don’t live in London or can’t take lots of time in the day to travel and attend meetings,” explains Clare Laxton, a trustee at the National Children’s Bureau. This could open the way for a new generation of more tech-savvy (but time-poor trustees) to join charities of many types, with all the positive implications for service delivery that digital technologies can bring.
Essex County Council is pleased to be working in collaboration with our residents to manage need in the time of Covid-19. While the arrival of Covid-19 in our county has brought with it many challenges it has also opened up new ways for us to support and work together with our residents.
To help us do this, Essex has become one of a small but growing number of local authorities to invest in a digital first approach and the latest tool we have invested in is Tribe.
Tribe is an intelligent app which was developed to address the issue of care dark spots in the UK. In a nutshell, it is Uber for the care and volunteering sectors. Community driven, it places the power in the hands of residents to ask for the help that they need and be matched with people to provide that help.
Through industry-leading ArtificialI Technology, Tribe has inbuilt capabilities to learn and respond to resident and community needs giving deep insight into where help is most needed. All of this is supported by a full suite of analytics which allows organisations and commissioners to undertake predictive needs analysis in real-time.
Tribe was originally identified as a potential solution to a number of public wellness issues in Essex. A pilot project to beta test a small localised rollout was already under discussion when Covid-19 emerged. Kirsty O’Callaghan, Head of Strengthening Communities realised that as well as being the solution to a number of existing problems, Tribe also had the potential to be an innovative solution to new issues emerging during the Covid-19 outbreak.
Early-stage trials were quickly mobilised and the rollout is now underway for the newest tool to support our residents.
The Tribe project is co-collaborative and invites local authorities using the technology to contribute to future development needs so that the software continues to meet the needs of our residents.
Tribe has the highest level of authentication from the NHS and Google. Microsoft has also offered their support to ensure continuity of service for the app.
A full overview can be found on the website and in the brochure.