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VCS Assembly: building voluntary and community sector resilience

Cost of living crisis: building voluntary and community sector resilience in the City and Hackney

VCS Assembly focus Oct - Dec 2022

What is community resilience? 

Community resilience is the sustained ability of communities to withstand, adapt to, and recover from adversity. 

Resilient communities promote individual and community physical, behavioural, and social health to strengthen their communities for daily, as well as extreme, challenges.

Why do we need community resilience? 

To support the VCS to continue to be able to deliver the important services and support they provide to the community in the wake of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and current cost-of-living crisis.

Aim of the Assembly: To build voluntary and community sector resilience to support them to continue to support our communities during challenging times this winter.

Objectives

Inform change

 Skills share

Collaborate
Understand the challenges our VCS and communities in City and Hackney are facing and share this information with relevant parties to lobby and make change on a larger, system scale

 Share skills with the VCS and community to help build community resilience including emotional and practical to cope with ongoing and new challenges

 Enable VCS organisations and health system partners to make connections and collaborate to share resources, information and skills, and be more resilient together
Share insights with:

  •  National VCS infrastructure organisations NAVCA and NCVO
  • Local City and Hackney Poverty response group led by Council and NHS staff
  • Other relevant organisations
 Deliver 3-5 FREE skills sessions based on VCS identified need to the VCS Share information across newsletters/networks/SIGs/VCS groups/system partners as it is shared with us on a specific “cost of living” page on Hackney CVS website which will be shared widely

We arranged free training for the VCS based on the insights we gained from this consultation:

  1. Developing communications for VCS Organisations delivered by expert from Good Governance

  2. Theory of Change delivered by Hackney CVS Organisational development team

  3. Reflective practice to support your emotional well-being course with Eden Jar

We have written an insight report based on the views of 37 community groups, networks and special interest groups, discussing the challenges that they are facing during the cost of living crisis.

Impact of cost of living crisis on VCS Organisations in City and Hackney – Insight Report

Insight themes:
1. Increasing costs
2. Need for funding
3. Limited organisational capacity
4. Recruitment challenges
5. Challenges in partnership working
6. Lack of social housing