Compact Voice’s blog

I recently had the opportunity to attend the Locality Annual Conference in Leicester, which proved to be really interesting – so thought I would provide a bit of an update on some of the things I saw and interesting projects I learnt about. Having never been to a Locality conference before, I wasn’t sure what to expect, though the agenda and list of speakers had set my expectations high. I was not disappointed.

This time last year, after our 2012 survey of local Compacts was published, I wrote the blog ‘In defence of the North East'. There had been a noticeable lack of responses to the survey from the North East, with only 5 of the 12 local Compacts in the region represented.

Well, what a difference a year makes!

This series of briefings explores some of the policy findings from our 2013 Annual Survey of Local Compacts in more depth. In our fifth and final installment, we look at the impact of Best Value Guidance, spending cuts and funding relationships.

This blog reveals results around how local authorities and voluntary sector organisations perceive that funding cuts are affecting them, how relationships between the sectors have fared and how they anticipate future funding and revenue will look.

I joined Compact Voice six months ago as an Engagement Development Officer covering the South East and East of England. 

I felt it was an auspicious year to arrive, as we’re celebrating 15 years of the Compact in 2013. I started my career as a project officer taking minutes at a local Compact development group back in the early 2000’s – and like the Compact, I’ve grown and changed a bit since then too.

This series of briefings explores some of the policy findings from our 2013 Annual Survey of Local Compacts in more depth. In our fourth blog, we look at the impact of Payment by Results.

This blog reveals results around how well PbR is understood by both sectors and whether respondents believe it will improve services.

This series of briefings explores some of the policy findings from our 2013 Annual Survey of Local Compacts in more depth. In our third blog, we look at perceptions of the Social Value Act.

This blog reveals the results around how well the Act is understood, whether respondents are having much involvement with the Act and how respondents perceive the Act’s potential.

This series of briefings explores some of the policy findings from our 2013 Annual Survey of Local Compacts in more depth. In our second blog, we explore our findings related to perceptions of the voluntary sector's independence.

This blog reveals results around the extent to which perceptions of independence vary between the public and voluntary sector.

This series of briefings explores some of the policy findings from our 2013 Annual Survey of Local Compacts in more depth. In our first blog, we look at the impact and perceptions of the new health and social care landscape.

This blog assesses the extent to which local Compacts are participating in and influencing partners in the new health landscape. Here, we also reveal which aspects of the new health structure Compact groups are engaging with.

Our annual survey has now closed, and I’ve begun the task of looking into the results. Some really interesting findings are beginning to emerge, which we’ll be sharing over the coming weeks in a series of blogs.