Schemes to be funded under the new national youth volunteering programme (in England), now named vinvolved, have been announced. They are split into two: vinvolved teams of youth experts who will encourage more community organisations to open their doors to young volunteers, and vinvolved projects providing a diverse range of volunteering opportunities.

Where there are still gaps in coverage around the country, a second round of applications will be announced before the end of December. See wearev for more details and a download of the funded schemes.

The scheme that offers grants of up to £2500 for young people aged 16 to 25 in England to set up their own community volunteering projects, vcashpoint, opens for applications on 5th December.

The e-petitions service which allows members of the public to present petitions to the Prime Minister without physically going to 10 Downing Street has reviewed its first year of operation. Of the over 29,000 petitions that have been submitted, around half (14,601) were rejected outright and this rundown of ‘facts, figures and progress’ gives a good idea of why this happens.

While there is room for improvement (and as it is based on open source code, anyone can contribute), they say “ePetitions has become a part of the landscape of debate in the UK”. http://www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page11051.asp

The Churches Community Value Toolkit, developed by the Church Urban Fund and others, is a way for churches to show what they contribute to their community in terms of outputs and outcomes. http://www.cuf.org.uk/page18562133.aspx.

A ‘Global Directory of Web Sites that List Online Volunteer Opportunities’ has been put online by the Canadian group Macdonald Youth Services as part of their range of resource on online volunteering.

Take a look at http://www.mys.ca/directory/.

A new NCVO Campaigning in Focus publication, ‘Tips on good practice in campaigning’ assesses the effectiveness of charity campaigns and provides insights under ten headings such as “Compile strong and compelling evidence” and “Stay with the issue through to resolution”.

Download from http://www.ncvo-vol.org.uk/ce/index.asp?id=7136

The Northern Ireland Executive is asking for views on its proposed priorities for the coming three years, accompanying budgets and the latest version of the ten year Investment Strategy.

Sector umbrella body NICVA has issued a briefing on this at http://www.nicva.org/index.cfm/section/news/key/pfg_budget_briefing_article. Consultation runs to 4th January.

The government’s environment department, Defra, is looking at how it can work better with voluntary sector organisations to tackle climate change and other problems.

A consultation document invites suggestions which will feed into preparing a Third Sector Strategy to be published spring 2008. Responses by 22nd February.

See http://www.defra.gov.uk/corporate/consult/thirdsector-strategy/index.htm

You may also want to take a look at the Sustainable Community Action wiki on this.

A number of connected consultations (for England), where you might like to take a look at NCVO’s Briefing on Developments on Local Government Issues first - in Word format, 235kb, from http://www.ncvo-vol.org.uk/index.asp?id=2445.

Community strategies, local area agreements, performance indicators

Draft guidance to local authorities and their partners on creating strong safe and prosperous communities, in connection with the Local Government and Public Involvement in Health Act 2007 is out for consultation. It covers Local Strategic Partnerships, Sustainable Community Strategies, the new duty to involve, Local Area Agreements, the revised best value regime and commissioning. Responses by 12th February. http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/localgovernment/statutoryguidance.

The government is also consulting to 21st December on the technical definitions for the set of 198 national performance indicators from which LSPs will chose up to 35 to apply locally. http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/localgovernment/indicatorsdefinitions

Sector representation in Local Strategic Partnerships

‘Principles of representation: A framework for effective third sector representation in Local Strategic Partnerships’ is a set of guiding principles intended to assist the local third sector to organise itself and maximise the impact of its voice on LSPs. Consultation to 12th February, http://www.communities.gov.uk/publications/communities/principlesofrepresentation.

Local snapshots in Comprehensive Area Assessments

Connected with the above is a consultation document on developing the Comprehensive Area Assessment by the Audit Commission. This is designed to give an annual snapshot of life in a local area and help local services to improve quality of life. To 12th February - see Office of Third Sector intro.

Anyone who wants to influence future training provision for the third sector in the North East of England should head over to the Skills Survey 2007/2008 at http://www.voluntaryskills.com/survey/survey.php?sid=30 by 7th December.

Three model governing documents that provide guidance for independent churches have been completed by umbrella group the Evangelical Alliance along with the Charity Commission and other input.

News release at http://www.eauk.org/media/model-documents.cfm, or go direct to http://www.eauk.org/model.

Guidance to provide voluntary and community organisations with best practice advice on financial reserves has been produced by Northern Ireland’s Department of Finance and Personnel, working with the sector.

More details and download from NICVA.

A lecture to the Royal Society of Arts last Monday (19th November) by director of research at New Philanthropy Capital, calling for an independent body to assess charities’ performance, has drawn a lot of coverage.

A feature in Society Guardian is adapted from the lecture, at http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/nov/20/voluntarysector1, and the proposal is discussed by Shelter’s chief exec at http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2007/nov/20/voluntarysector.comment. A spokesman for Phil Hope, the cabinet office minister responsible for charities, has however said the proposal would result in “unacceptable red tape”.

New Philanthropy Capital news item, with link to full text of lecture, at http://www.philanthropycapital.org/html/newsStory201107.php.