The second year of the Sheila McKechnie Awards, an annual scheme for emerging and grassroots campaigners, is open for applications. It provides support, skills development and knowledge sharing, not cash.

Nine awards are available, across the social action fields of Conflict Resolution, Consumer Action, Economic Justice, Environment, Health & Social Care, International Campaigner, Social Inclusion, Transport and Young Campaigners (18-24). Closing date 18th December. http://www.sheilamckechnie.org.uk/showSub.php?id=70&page=3%20.

Research from Volunteering England and Institute for Volunteering Research says that fear of litigation and red tape is getting in the way of volunteering. More than a quarter of organisations reckoned that potential volunteers were deterred from volunteering, with some even calling off events and activities because the insurance premiums were too high.

A Risk Toolkit launched on 13th October will enable volunteer-involving organisations to appreciate the benefits of sensible risk management. ‘How to take care of risk in volunteering: a guide for organisations’ can be downloaded as a rather large pdf (4.7MB). It is well worth getting though (by nearly all organisations) and the Introduction page by itself may well reassure many a worried trustee that, though risk management is important, it is largely about things they should be doing already.

Press release includes links to the report summarising the research, ‘On the Safe Side’, but note that it is a massive 8.5MB.pdf file. There is also an accompanying blog, to allow people to comment and raise issues, at http://www.volunteeringengland.blogspot.com.

The Community Archives web site has been set up to show the variety and quantity of community archives in the UK, ranging from Hereford’s Cider Museum to Derbyshire’s Magic Attic Archives.

The directory is split into Black, minority and ethnic communities, Local or regional, National collections and Special interest communities. http://www.communityarchives.org.uk.

(Source: PublicTechnology.net)

A new funding information resource for London’s voluntary and community sector is due to go live on 11th October.

It is part of the London Funders site, and is itself funded by ChangeUp: http://www.londonfunders.org.uk/elf/.

NCVO’s ‘Introductory Pack on Funding and Finance’ is designed for small and medium-sized voluntary and community organisations and in particular for the funding advisors who work with them.

Pdf versions can be downloaded from http://www.ncvo-vol.org.uk/sfp/index.asp?id=3199.

‘Recruiting volunteers: a manual of good practice’ can be downloaded as a pdf file, 883kb, from the WCVA web site. Go to the bottom part of the page to locate.

This isn’t a new publication (published March 2006), but just flagged up in their e-newsletter.

Usable Websites is a new Glasgow-based charity that has been set up to give away to other charities and not for profit organisations, professional looking websites that are very easy to update completely free of charge. Read the rest of this entry »

GuideStar UK, the online database of charities (currently just those registered in England and Wales), has added a photo gallery section. This could be used to illustrate the work of the charity.

From inspecting the example sites from the GuideStar newsletter, however, there doesn’t appear to be a proper ‘thumbnail’ facility, making the gallery slow to load particularly on dial-up connections e.g. Gael Music: http://www.guidestar.org.uk/gs_summary.aspx?ccreg=1115890.

The new government agency dealing with environmental matters, Natural England, has launched.

It brings together English Nature, the environment activities of the Rural Development Service and the Countryside Agency’s Landscape, Access and Recreation division.

News item at http://www.naturalengland.org.uk/press/news/021006.htm.

Applications for scholarships for the next set of admissions to the MBA run by the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship are needed by 27th October. http://www.sbs.ox.ac.uk/skoll/mba/MBA+Programme.htm.

The Canadian nonprofit sector “may come to know September 25, 2006 as their own Black Monday”, according to Charity Village. The new Conservative government in that country has revealed plans to trim about $1 billion in federal spending over the next two years, a good chunk of the cuts impacting programs in the voluntary sector. The Canadian Volunteerism Initiative is one which is losing close to $10 million. Cover story currently at http://www.charityvillage.com/cv/news/cover.asp, will move to http://www.charityvillage.com/cv/archive/acov.html.

We note that it’s only a month or so since the International Journal of Not-for-Profit Law published an article comparing the sector Compact in England with the Accord agreement over there. http://www.icnl.org/knowledge/ijnl/vol8iss4/special_4.htm.

A Department of Health discussion document is asking how urgent care services, such as GP practices, NHS Walk-in Centres, and ambulance services, can best work together to create services that respond more effectively to local patients’ needs.

Press release at http://www.gnn.gov.uk/environment/fullDetail.asp?ReleaseID=231865&NewsAreaID=2, or go direct to the document. Closing date 5th January 2007.