PAPER E

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, PLANNING, TOURISM AND LEISURE SERVICES SELECT COMMITTEE – 27 OCTOBER 2003

REVIEW OF EXTERNAL FUNDING SERVICE ROLE OF CORPORATE POLICY AND COMMUNICATIONS UNIT

REPORT OF THE HEAD OF CORPORATE POLICY AND COMMUNICATIONS

REASON FOR SELECT COMMITTEE CONSIDERATION

Review of External Funding Service within the Corporate Policy Unit

ACTION REQUIRED BY THE SELECT COMMITTEE

Consider and comment upon the service delivered

BACKGROUND

Arising from the Economic Development Best Value Report and the creation of a new Corporate Policy and Communications Unit, it was determined to create a new ‘External Funding Service’ as part pf this unit. Established with effect from November 2002, the core role of the External Funding Officer and the Assistant Funding Officer is to provide corporate information, advice and support to Council Departments and partner agencies. They are also required to monitor funding issues at a strategic level, work together with key funders and project partners and contribute to policy development where necessary and have also been given the responsibility of promoting and supporting Council applications for awards.

The key outputs of the service developed in 2003 are:

Funding Support Website Set up on iwight.com, this includes a database, a ‘Latest News’ section, useful websites and strategies links and a ‘how to’ section to help applicants

E-mail circular - regular ‘latest news’ e-mails are sent out to a wide variety of contacts, both internal and external to the Council

Internal funding contacts from across the Council have been designated to receive and disseminate information

Support has been provided for a variety of applications to a total value of £5.6 million and details are provided in the following table.

Applications supported through feedback or bid writing

Fund	Applicant	Approved	Approximate Value
Invest to Save Expression of Interest	IOW Council – Social Services / Planning	No	N/A
Neighbourhood Learning Scheme	IOW Council – Adult and Community Learning Team	Yes	£53,000
European Social Fund	IOW Council – Social Services	TBA	£230,000
European Social Fund	IOW Council – Adult and Community Learning Team	TBA	£525,000
European Social Fund	IOW Council – Education	TBA	£200,000
Neighbourhood Management Pathfinder Expression of Interest	IOW Council – Policy Unit	Yes	N/A
Neighbourhood Management Pathfinder	IOW Council – Policy Unit	TBA	£2.5 million
Basic Skills Capacity Building Initiative	Portsmouth Council with IOW as partner	Yes	£70,000
Basic Skills Capacity Building Initiative	Portsmouth Council with IOW as partner	Yes	£20,000
European Social Fund	Isle of Wight College with Social Services and others as partners	TBA	£140,000
European Social Fund	Isle of Wight College with Connexions and others as partners	TBA	£130,000
European Social Fund	Isle of Wight Economic Partnership – with IOW Council as partner	TBA	£1,000,000
European Social Fund	Care Learning Centre – involvement supported by Social Services	TBA	3 bids total value £800,000
European Social Fund	Real World Trust – involvement supported by Social Services	TBA	£95,000
Total value			£5,620,000
Total TBA			£5,477,000
Total Value approved to date			£143,000

Additional Council services/teams supported with specific funding advice:

Ø Library Service – Paul Hamlyn Foundation application possible

Ø Archaeology – Local Heritage Initiative application possible

Ø Arts Unit – Arts Council application possible

Ø Corporate Policy Unit / AONB – Landscape Partnership application possible

Ø Corporate Policy Unit / Unison – Union Learning Fund application possible

Ø Housing Services – decided against submission of ESF application

Ø Drug and Alcohol Team – decided against submission of ESF application

Ø ICT – decided against submission to Partnership at Work Fund

In addition a number of general funding enquiries have also been addressed.

Project Monitoring – this area will be addressed in the coming months and a system installed in partnership with Finance to ensure that both the strategic and financial issues associated with project monitoring are addressed together.

Key Funding Related Policy input:

Ø Area Investment Framework – co-ordinating Council input into Isle of Wight Economic Partnership paper to SEEDA on Area Investment Framework priorities

Ø European Social Fund consultation – co-ordinated feedback to Learning and Skills Council on behalf of Island and co-ordinated LASER (Local Authority South East Region ESF group) response to GOSE re ESF

Ø Lottery review – contributed to (Local Authority) South East Lottery Forum feedback to National Lottery re their restructuring plans

Ø Sit on Advisory Panel for Global Grants in Hampshire and Isle of Wight

Ø Sit on ESF marking panels at Government Office for the South East

Awards applied for:

Ø Beacon Council Scheme – assisted Early Years with their submission, (first Beacon application ever submitted by Council) - awaiting result

Ø Local Government Chronicle Awards – 2 applications will be submitted in October 2003, The Community Partnership network will be submitted under the ‘Community Partnership Award’ and the Council web site will be submitted under ‘Improving Services with E-technology’

Issues and Opportunities which may influence the future nature of the external funding service provided:

• Issue - Chances for obtaining additional funding for delivery of core Council services are few.

• Issue and Opportunity - Most opportunities for Local Authorities to bid for additional funding come through central Government Departments or their national or regional delivery agencies such as SEEDA and many are ring fenced to a few chosen authorities.

• Opportunity - While these funds are not always strictly ‘External’, they offer some of the best opportunities and therefore the funding support role must include supporting Council Departments in obtaining them where possible. Offers of support have been made to Council departments whenever this issue has arisen.

• Issue - Most Council Departments have a staff resource problem. This has two features, either they do not have the time to write applications and/or they do not have the resources to deliver a new project or service, which of course is what the vast majority of funding opportunities will require. The Funding service can help with the former to some degree but cannot help with the latter which may restrict the number of applications submitted.

• Issue and Opportunity - The Government is stating that it wishes to see more public services delivered through the voluntary and community sector and through Social Enterprises and is allocating funding in this area – £125 million through Futurebuilders for example.

The IOW Council needs to have a clearer idea of how it wishes to increase/expand/support the VCO and Social Enterprise sectors in the delivery of public services on the Island and how it will manage this process.

• Issue - The European Social Fund will only offer very limited opportunities next year and may disappear totally thereafter. This has been the Island’s main source of EU funding over the past few years with £1.5m to £2m approved annually for Isle of Wight organisations.

• Opportunity - The Area Investment Framework paper is a crucial document in terms of providing an Island strategy for future regeneration investment through SEEDA and potentially other bodies and the Council is supporting the IWEP in its preparation.

RELEVANT PLANS, POLICIES, STRATEGIES AND PERFORMANCE INDICATORS

The summary update provided relates to the Corporate Policy Unit service plan objective of ‘Establishing an External Funding Service’.

CONSULTATION PROCESS

• Internal and external partners were consulted re the structure and content of the website prior to its creation.
• Funding Contacts have been identified across the Council and informal feedback has been provided by some contacts.
• Presentations detailing the Funding Service at Senior Management meetings have been delivered to Corporate Services, Social Services and Education and Environmental Services will be delivered shortly now that a new Director is in place. Extra presentations have also been provided to Financial Services and Children’s Services.

FINANCIAL, LEGAL, CRIME AND DISORDER IMPLICATIONS

There are no legal or crime and disorder implications as a direct result of this report. There are clearly financial implications but they do not necessarily affect the Council budget as they are additional resources and cannot reliably be predicted. Legal obligations will result from any contracts entered into as a result of funding being approved.

BACKGROUND PAPERS USED IN THE PREPARATION OF THIS REPORT

Corporate Policy Unit Service Plan

Contact Point : Michael Bulpitt; External Funding Officer; Ext 3141; email: [email protected].

JOHN BENTLEY

Head of Corporate Policy and Communications