A Community Allowance Pilot Programme
We are currently working on plans to pilot the Community Allowance. In September 2009 we asked community organisations who were interested in running the Community Allowance to contact us. We were delighted when 176 community organisations from across the UK contacted us to express an interest in being part of a pilot programme.
It was a challenge choosing just three to work with as there were so many inspiring and necessary project ideas put forward. However, we eventually chose three organisations to partner with for our first pilot and they are:
Foresight which will pilot the Community Allowance across North East Lincolnshire
Learning Links which will pilot the Community Allowance across Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight
St Peter's Partnerships which will pilot the Community Allowance across Tameside in Greater Manchester
With these partners, we submitted a Right to Bid proposal to the Department for Work and Pensions. The Right to Bid scheme was a fund that would enable any organisation to propose to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) a new way of delivering any of its services. Unfortuntely, in June 2010 the Right to Bid scheme was closed by the government. We are now actively fundraising to pilot the Community Allowance.
We are also in discussions with a number of Welfare to Work Providers to include the Community Allowance model in their Work Programme delivery – so that Welfare to Work providers can contract with local community based organisations to deliver the Community Allowance – creating local jobs and local community based services as an integrated part of Welfare to Work delivery. The Community Allowance provides an approach that will multiply the impact of existing money and resources that will be spent in local communities through The Work Programme.
If you are a Welfare to Work Provider or a community organisation interested in deliverying the Community Allowance, find out more here or contact us
