To unsubscribe from this Mailing or to opt out of all Halton and St Helens Voluntary and Community Action Mailings please use the links found at the bottom of the page.

Welcome to the latest edition of the Halton & St Helens Voluntary and Community Action E-Bulletin...

Senior Officer (Data Analysis) and Programme Support Officer Vacancies

The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority is embarking on its search for exceptional individuals with the passion to deliver on their vision and help to create a truly global and competitive City Region at the heart of the Northern Powerhouse. If you have the skills and ambition for this City Region and thrive on tough challenges and getting results, then they want to hear from you. They currently a vacancy for a Senior Officer (Data Analysis) and also for a Programme Support Officer...

Building a Stronger Britain Together

The Building a Stronger Britain Together (BSBT) programme is a Home Office funding opportunity, which supports civil society and community organisations who work to create more resilient communities, stand up to extremism in all its forms and offer vulnerable individuals a positive alternative, regardless of race, faith, sexuality, age and gender. The programme allows organisations that share these aims to bid for in-kind support and grant funding for specific programmes that deliver goals set out in the Counter Extremism Strategy. The call for grant funding is open from Monday 15th January 2018 at 3pm until Friday 16th February 2018 at 5pm...

Police Warn Residents Following Courier Fraud Incidents Across Cheshire

Cheshire Police is warning residents across the county not to fall foul of Courier Fraud following reports in Crewe, Nantwich and Chester. Courier fraud is when the offender cold calls the victim posing as an official such as a police officer or a member of a banks fraud team. They will instruct the victim to go to their bank and withdraw money. The offender will claim that they are investigating staff at the bank that they need the victim's help in some kind of undercover operation, for example they may claim that bank staff are handing out counterfeit bank notes and they need the victim to withdraw money so that it can be examined. There are many variations of this scam, which may involve the victim handing over bank cards or high value items...

Talkfest Winter - How Does Our Local NHS Handle Winter Pressures?

NHS St Helens Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) are reaching out to local residents to talk about winter pressures on the NHS including misuse of antibiotics, knowing the right place to go to when you need care quickly and knowing how to best stay well over the winter period. The NHS faces some of its biggest pressures in the winter time and they want to talk to you about how we can all best tackle issues with ​Antibiotics, Emergency and Urgent Care, Pharmacy and Caring For Yourself. ​Whilst the CCG's role at the NHS is to work on tackling these key issues, they want to talk to you to hear your ideas and questions about how we can all work together to help these pressures. Join in the conversation at the Talkfest  debate event...

Halton Carers Hospital Liaison Service

Do you care for someone who is currently in hospital, or do you care for someone and are going into hospital yourself for a planned admission? Lucia Urquhart who is a hospital liaison support worker at Halton Carers’  Centre can assist you with any questions you may have around hospitals / admissions / discharge / care at home and liaise with hospital staff and social services on your behalf. It can be a very stressful and confusing time not knowing what happens following a hospital stay. Lucia can attend discharge meetings with you to make sure you are fully aware what is going to happen when a patient is discharged...

Steps Supported Lodgings Project

Do you have a spare room in your home? Would you like to become a host, accommodating a local young person? SHAP are a specialist housing organisation, existing to enable young and vulnerable people to have their housing needs appropriately met. The organisation provides high quality accommodation with support for young and vulnerable people who are homeless, in housing need or experiencing disruption and difficulty in their life. To expand on the work they are doing in St Helens and recognising that hostel or group living is not always the best option for some young people, they are working with St Helens Council to develop a Supported Lodging service and we would like to recruit suitable householders from the St Helens area... 

CORC/Anna Freud Learning Network Free eLearning

The Child Outcomes Research Consortium (CORC), in partnership with the Anna Freud Learning Network, has developed its first ever online eLearning module: ‘Measuring mental wellbeing to improve the lives of children and young people’. This eLearning aims to increase the awareness, understanding and confidence of non-specialist and school staff who support the wellbeing and mental health of children or young people to access the benefits associated with measuring mental wellbeing. This free interactive short course aims to demystify and simplify the whole process of using outcomes and feedback measures to monitor mental wellbeing and is laid out in six easy to follow parts...

Halton Peoples Health Forum Events

Halton Peoples Health Forum has 2 events taking place on Tuesday 27th February 2018 and Thursday 1st March 2018. Topics to be discussed include Cancer awareness, GP/Care home alignment - feedback and Access to primary care. This is a free event and you can meet local GP's and Health professionals...

Shomobility St Helens Has Moved To New Premises

Shopmobility St Helens which provides electric wheelchairs, mobility scooters and a range of transit wheelchairs for hire both short and long term, has now moved to the Independent Living Store based at St Mary's Arcade...

Job Vacancy At Community Action Wirral

Community Action Wirral is recruiting for a Head of Service. This is a full time position based in The Lauries in Birkenhead with a salary of £30-35k dependent upon experience.  The post holder will deliver the newly acquired not for profit infrastructure contract for the Borough. The deadline for applications is Wednesday 31st January 2018 at 5pm...

Maintenance of Parks, Cemeteries and Open Spaces and Ranger Service Consultation 2018

St Helens Council would be very grateful if you could complete their online survey and let them know your views on the proposed changes to the way they maintain our parks and the future of the Ranger Service as well as any ideas you have about how they can deliver services collaboratively in the future...

Youth Social Action Fund

Youth social action has huge potential to create enjoyable opportunities and skills development for young people, benefitting local people and places. The aim of this grant is to raise the level and quality of youth social action. The programme aim is to increase youth social action by 50% by 2020 taking the percentage of young people that volunteer from 40% to 60%. Social action involves activities such as campaigning, fundraising and volunteering, all of which enable participants to make a positive difference to their communities. Big Lottery Fund and the Office for Civil Society have invested £2 million this year to fund groups delivering local youth social action opportunities... 

Time to Change Champion Information Event

Want to help tackle mental health stigma in Halton? The Time to Change Information event is taking place on 22nd February 10am to 12 noon at The Studio, Widnes and is being run in partnership with Time to Change. They are hoping to engage people from all backgrounds to join them in tackling mental health stigma...

Boost Your Physical And Mental Wellbeing With Yoga At The Living Well

Want to improve your general wellbeing and learn how to manage your stress level more effectively? Why not try Yoga at Willowbrook-The Living Well, Borough Rd, St Helens? Focusing on strength, flexibility and breathing, yoga is a safe and effective way to improve your physical health, especially strength, flexibility and balance as well as being beneficial for people with high blood pressure, heart disease, aches and pains – including lower back pain – depression and stress...

Halton Carers Hospital Liaison Service

Do you care for someone who is currently in hospital, or do you care for someone and are going into hospital yourself for a planned admission? Lucia Urquhart who is a hospital liaison support worker at Halton Carers’  Centre can assist you with any questions you may have around hospitals / admissions / discharge / care at home and liaise with hospital staff and social services on your behalf. It can be a very stressful and confusing time not knowing what happens following a hospital stay. Lucia can attend discharge meetings with you to make sure you are fully aware what is going to happen when a patient is discharged...

Vacancies: Apex Charitable Trust Ltd

Apex Charitable Trust Ltd provides information, advice and guidance to offenders/ex-offenders, supporting them into employment, training, education and voluntary work by assisting them in breaking down the barriers they face when moving forward with a conviction. Based in St Helens with outreach across the Liverpool City Region, ACT 4 Women is a peer support project. Beneficiaries are unemployed women ex-offenders. They currently have a vacancy for a Information, Advice and Guidance Officer (17 ½ hrs per week) and for a Volunteer Coordinator / Assessor (28 hrs per week)...

Press Release From The Police Commissioner For Merseyside

Merseyside’s Police Commissioner is asking local people if they would be willing to pay a little extra to help protect police officer numbers and recruit new armed officers after the government sidestepped its responsibility to invest in the police service. After seven years of austerity, the Government announced in December that the police would, once again, receive no more new money from the Home Office to tackle crime in Merseyside. Instead, Policing Minister Nick Hurd MP announced Police and Crime Commissioners would be expected to ask local taxpayers to pay up to  £1 a month extra towards their police service through their council tax...

Listening Ear Subsidised Training

Listening Ear, a Knowsley-based social enterprise delivering counselling and therapy services, has been approved as a learning provider for the Skills for Growth Service. Skills for Growth supports businesses in the Liverpool City Region to invest in improving the skills and productivity of their workforce. Listening Ear has been approved as a training provider with Skills for Growth and as a result can offer subsidised training to companies within the Liverpool City Region, which includes Liverpool, Knowsley, St.Helens, Sefton, Wirral and Halton. The funding is subject to the company being eligible, but in theory an SME could receive 80% funding, which is a huge saving for smaller organisations...

Digital Pilot In St Helens Starting January 2018

St Helens is set to be the first area in the City Region to trial a digital approach to accessing travel information after Liverpool City Region Transport Committee members agreed to a six month pilot earlier this week. Over the last five years the number of outlets receiving paper timetables and other information has reduced and increasingly more people are accessing travel information online. It means that during the pilot period, bus paper timetables, area map leaflets and general ticketing booklets will be removed from the St Helen’s Merseytravel Centre and 16 other outlets, such as health centres and libraries. If successful, the pilot could be rolled out across the Liverpool City Region, contributing to savings of up to £140k a year...

Mental Health Training

Are you helping to support someone who has a Mental Health diagnosis, this can be someone with depression, anxiety, bipolar, OCD etc if so Halton Carers' centre have some great training which is available at their Runcorn Centre. There are 2 different courses which can be accessed the first is basic Mental Health Training which covers all mental health and is covered over 2 sessions, the 2nd course is specifically around Personality Disorders and again is 2 sessions.  You can choose which course is more suited to yourself or you can access both courses.  To book a place please contact the centre...

Please feel free to forward this email onto any other organisations/individuals who you feel would be interested. Apologies if you receive this email more than once.

If you have any comments you would like to tell us about this e-bulletin, please send an email to ldaffern@haltonsthelensvca.org.uk or if you have any news/events you would like us to publicise, please complete our News/Events webform: https://www.haltonsthelensvca.org.uk/vca-newsevents-template

Halton and St Helens Voluntary and Community Action