Safer Future Communities

Safer Future Communities is a strategic partnership - led by Clinks of which Women's Resource Centre is a partner - aimed at supporting frontline voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations in preparation for the arrival of Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) in November 2012. The aim is to build a strong, vibrant and influential voluntary and community sector network in each of the PCC areas in England and Wales to ensure their knowledge of local needs is recognised in developing local policing plans.

The project will prepare, empower and modernise the VCSE sector at a local level to engage with their PCCs by helping them to identify the skills and tools they need to develop and communicate a convincing case about local needs on community safety issues and how the sector can contribute to these.

This will aim to secure more effective working relationships between the VCSE sector, Community Safety Partnerships, PCCs and other statutory agencies that impact on community safety.

By engaging with a diverse range of partners, the project will ensure that the breadth of Home Office community safety issues (crime, anti-social behaviour, re-offending, substance misuse, violence against women and girls and youth crime) are represented.

WRC is working on providing a gendered analysis and understanding of issues surrounding VAWG and other issues involving women. Other organisations working on the project include Drugscope, National Council for Voluntary Youth Services (NCVYS), working with their partner Council for Wales of Voluntary Youth Services (CWVYS), National Association of Voluntary and Community Action (NAVCA) and Wales Council for Voluntary Action (WCVA).

This strategic partnership will also link with a wider group of VCSE stakeholders, including Victim Support, Neighbourhood Watch, Social Enterprise UK and many others. Clinks has been awarded a total of £1.1 million, over two years, by the Home Office to deliver this work.

Activities

There will be a series of regional briefing events to which all local VCSE organisations will be invited. The dates and venues of these events are published on the Clinks website.

WRC has published a briefing (256KB) for the violence against women and girls sector as the changes will particularly affect them. We would urge organisations to read the very short briefing and attend one of the events that are happening in February and March. This will be a chance to discuss the opportunities and barriers of engagement in the new structures as a sector. It will be really important to have as many VAWG organisations as possible in attendance.

WRC has published a timeline (52KB) and checklist (286KB) that may be useful to organisations looking to organise in preparation for the elections across the country (except London) in November.

Please fill out our very short 5 minute survey so we can assess how WRC can best support you.

Feed VAWG issues into Victim Support Advocate Reports by contacting your regional lead.

There will be regular updates on the project progress on the Clinks website but if you have any queries or would like more information, please contact Linda Pizani Williams, Project Manager, on Lindapizani.williams@clinks.org 

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