Equal-Works

Background

The Powys Equals Partnership partners have come together from both voluntary and statutory sectors to develop pathways to work for groups who often face persistent barriers to employment. Three key elements - social enterprise projects, the value of lived experience skills, and integrated service delivery - all have important contributions to make to the local economy and enhance the development, management and delivery of services, enterprises and other initiatives.

Social enterprises account for 5% of all businesses with employees nationwide and contribute £8.4 billion per year to the UK economy - almost 1% of annual GDP. Within Powys there are a number of excellent examples of social enterprise that provide services: Cae Post (re-cycling), SIREN (woodwork products) and Arcady (community regeneration through cultural tourism). This DP has been learning from them to overcome barriers and support the development of new approaches.

Aims

Powys Equals Partnership aims to develop employment opportunities for disadvantaged groups in the labour market across Powys, Wales, by focusing on social enterprise models, community approaches to service provision, and social inclusion in rural communities.

Objectives

• Develop services that meet the needs of people from more than one disadvantaged group
• Create job opportunities for people who have learned from experiences of overcoming barriers associated with disability or disadvantage
• Establish a network of supported self-help services by training family members who have lived experience to be trainers and facilitators
• Support social enterprises that actively include opportunities for people who have experienced exclusion.

Activities

• Producing report and guidelines on the ethics of social enterprise marketing based on research conducted with SIREN social enterprise
• Developing benefits chart to help employees of social firms understand the impact of employment on benefits
• Collating findings and papers on equality and disability discrimination with a view to offering improved practices for access to work and responsible employment
• Developing the concept of a College of Acknowledged Lived Experience
• Establishing integrated services for people who have been displaced through being in care or for social or health related reasons, and families who have complex needs that impact on child care within the home
• Sharing responsible employers work programmes with local authority, national parks, the health authority and other local employers.

Target Groups

• Unemployed
• Migrants
• Ethnic minorities
• Asylum seekers
• People with physical disabilities
• People coping with mental health issues
• Substance abusers
• Homeless people
• Ex-offenders
• People leaving care

This Development Partnership was not involved in Round One.

The Powys Association for Voluntary Organisations (PAVO) has brought together a number of voluntary and statutory sector organisations to develop pathways to work for specific disadvantaged groups and to tackle barriers that reinforces stigma, organisations that find it difficult to include people from disadvantaged groups, and employment practices that do not directly benefit beneficiaries.

To mainstream “Acknowledged Lived Experience” in the region.

The DP has developed this concept of valuing the skills learned as a result of overcoming discrimination as a new pathway to employment. This pathway has been supported by the partnership organisations and the language of ALE discussed within the groups and their stakeholders.
Powys Mental Health Alliance has been successful in recruiting personnel and embedded this within their own recruitment processes

Responsible Employment Scheme

PCC has developed a scheme involving 8 people who had previous difficulty entering the workplace, the HR team identified mentors in the workforce prepared to support the new workers. The results are really good cohesion and positivity in the departments where short hour workers were accommodated, mentors undertook training as volunteers. Additionally the growth and development of the new member of staff and their skills and abilities was marked, with most wanting to extend their employment hours. The scheme is set to continue as it is embedded into the council structure. A support group of responsible employers led by PCC will develop and already sign up to the responsible employers forum is underway. This will embed the finding from PCC and encourage others to offer supported placements within their organisations. Further to this the recruitment toolkit offers additional guidelines for equality and diversity in the workplace

Social Enterprise

Seven organisations have recognised that social enterprise provides a vehicle for employment of people who have lived experience in delivering services to  the community, that the skills of ale members can augment existing services and improve them. Each partner has developed a business which works directly within the community to increase equality and diversity, integration and acceptance. 

 Partner Cae Post has been working to set a precedent in Powys to develop legal structures which will allow social  to tender for large contracts from the County Council . this work has not been achieved before in Powys and opens up tendering for other social businesses capable of delivering on a large scale providing the added value of employing people from the whole community. The County benefits as Cae Post is a significant employer in North Powys, has developed and integrated this employment philosophy into the fabric of its organisation, not only recruiting equally using the system it developed through Equals but also  it is about to build its capacity to trade nationally and commercially along side non-equal organisations not able to offer  the care service, support or opportunity to people who have previously struggled to find work. 

The Recruitment Toolkit is a major work

It brings together the thinking of the partnership under one heading .It has many benefits and underpins more than one ongoing project. It offers support to both employers and employees alike, generating a better understanding of employment potential in Powys.

It is bi lingual English and Welsh, the major document Diversity at Work is also offered as an audio document on a CD. And visual documents showing the projects, responsible employment, integrated working and social enterprise illustrated as short movies.

Powys Alliance for Mental Health has been supportive in developing First Steps to Work.
People start the process of thinking about work at many levels, this booklet engages them to enter at any stage they feel appropriate to them. It offers f a directory of support organisations which help solve the problems faced by people managing discrimination and stigma, to help break down the barriers to work