Capacitybuilders - Improving support for a stronger third sector

28/06/2007

Winchester Area Community Action (WACA) is forging links with and empowering local minority ethnic groups

Winchester’s black and minority ethnic (BME) population is growing but relatively low at 2.6% (2001 census) and this means that ethnic groups may be even more isolated than elsewhere and children are often in very small minorities in school.

Understanding local needs

The Black and Minority Ethnic Engagement Project has gained better knowledge of local needs, forged links with and supported emerging BME groups, such as the Footsteps – multicultural group.  The project has also run workshops for other support organisations in Hampshire and produced a good practice guide.

Building on the work of the Hampshire Black and Minority Ethnic Awareness Project (BMAP), the engagement project is aimed at understanding the support needs of BME communities, including faith groups, gypsies and travellers, and migrant workers.

Linking with local agencies

The BMAP project was Capacitybuilders/ChangeUp funded through the Hampshire Consortium, for which Community Action Hampshire is the county-wide accountable body. Locally based pilot work in Winchester was funded through BMAP, enabling WACA to link into other local agencies.

Steering group

An experienced and diverse steering group led by WACA is the driving force behind the engagement project.  Members include local representatives from a housing association, the council, fire service,  police, university, primary care trust and mental health services.   They contributed ethnic data gathered from their own work as well as knowledge of existing groups. 

Project worker Lois Hutchinson set out to identify and engage with communities across the district to find out about needs and any barriers that might exist in terms of social inclusion and access to services, and how these might be overcome.

Uniting different cultures

The Footsteps multicultural group started out as an informal prayer group of mainly African women.  Group leader Dorothy Nel from Kenya wanted to do more to bring families from different cultures together to learn from each other, but was not sure where to start and did not want to take on all the work herself. 

WACA helped Dorothy to organise an African themed social evening in a local pub.  This was a toe in the water event to gauge interest from minority communities about getting together to experience the food, music and lifestyle of different cultures.

Starting to see a change

Around 50 people turned up including Mbeka Chifunda from Tanzania with his drums:  “When I arrived seven years ago, you would hardly see a black face and in a way I was lonely.  Winchester is changing and we thought, why can’t we start something?”

Development Support Officer Hannah Williams was introduced to the fledgling community group and helped Footsteps to establish itself on a proper footing with a constitution and elected committee.

Mbeka, now Chair of Footsteps explains:  “It could have been difficult to get Footsteps off the ground without help... to get to this point where we are officially registered, have funding and public insurance.”

Developing important links

In May 2006 the secretary of the Winchester Muslim and Cultural Association (WMCA)  became a welcome new steering group member and has developed important links with the local agencies.  A Muslim women’s group has now formed as a sub-group of WMCA to provide access to education, social and leisure activities.  High on the list of priorities is the need for a place for the women to pray as they have to travel to mosques in London or Southampton at present.

Community partnerships

The project’s many activities and outcomes included a BME engagement event at the University of Winchester in September 2006 during which Parvin Damani, a public health specialist and race equality adviser for the NHS delivered a keynote speech. 

She challenged the audience to bring about change in systems, policies and processes:  “Partnerships with our communities have to be meaningful and commitment and respect genuine.  This is really important if we are to provide a fair, just and appropriate service to them and work towards eliminating oppression.”

BME forum

The event, which included workshops on housing, education, community safety and health, attracted 66 delegates from 25 different agencies.  Offers of support for the project came from 19 people and 25 expressed interest in a BME forum. 

In November 2006 WACA set up a local BME electronic forum to share ideas and information.  The forum now has 40 members.

Sharing experiences

A further event took place in March 2007 attended by 30  delegates representing Councils for Voluntary Service and other support organisations across the county.  This offered a chance for the project workers to share their experience of engaging with BME groups in both city and rural areas. 

“It has been really beneficial to meet and speak to people already working on projects and to idea swap," commented one delegate.  Another valued the opportunity to hear about other people’s experiences saying that it was:  “Very useful to find out about other BME groups operating in Winchester.”