1 Apr 2003

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0><tr> <td valign="top" colspan=2 height=90 BGCOLOR="#006699" TEXT="#080000" background="09ed05a3.jpg"> <div> <FONT SIZE="2" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" ><B>          </B></FONT><FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Arial" ><B>                             </B></FONT><FONT SIZE="5" COLOR="#FF0000" FACE="Arial" ><B>    Reading Council for Voluntary Youth Service</B></FONT><B>    </B><B> </B></div> <div> </div> </td> </tr><tr> <td valign="top" width=210 BGCOLOR="#FFCC66" TEXT="#080000" background="09fd2123.jpg"> <div> <B><IMG BORDER="0" SRC="Symb075c00b700c8ff000000.png" HEIGHT="13" WIDTH="24" ALIGN="bottom" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0">1 Apr 2003</B></div> <div> <A HREF="id29.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="10 July (AGM)"><U><B>10 July (AGM)</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id30.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="13 Nov"><U><B>13 Nov</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id33.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="20 Jan 2004"><U><B>20 Jan 2004</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id51.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="22 Jun 2004"><U><B>22 Jun 2004</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id90.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="19 Oct 2004"><U><B>19 Oct 2004</B></U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="id87.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="2 Mar 2005"><U><B>2 Mar  2005</B></U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE=" Reading Council for Voluntary Youth "><U><B>Home</B></U></A></div> <bR> <bR> </td> <td valign="top" height=390 BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#080000"> <div> <I>1 Apr 2003</I></div> <div> <B><U>Notes of the Reading Council for Voluntary Youth Services (RCVYS) Meeting held on I April 2003 at South Street Reading from 12.15-2pm</U></B></div> <bR> <div> <B>Present:</B></div> <div> Deborah Fox (Children's Information Centre)</div> <div> Lynsey Harrison ( Reading Voluntary Action)</div> <div> Rhiannon Williams (RVA)</div> <div> Karen Brown (BYCVS</div> <div> Kevin Terry (N0.5)</div> <div> Joe Green (Millennium Volunteers)</div> <div> Chris Evans (Churches Together)</div> <div> Richard Stowell (Reading Children's Fund)</div> <div> Vic Hills (YMCA)</div> <div> Alison Steedman (Duke of Edinburgh's Award)</div> <bR> <div> <B>Apologies for Absence</B>: Gaynor Burton; Ray Tapken, Mary Jacobs, Simon Doherty.</div> <bR> <div> Matters arising from the notes of 5 February: Richard Stowell was present.</div> <bR> <div> 1 Review of Reading Youth and Community Service.</div> <div> When the review is complete a report for public consumption will be published.  The voluntary sector will be involved, as contracts will be reassessed. There will be a Best Value follow up.  There should be clearer statements for the service to show its involvement with Millennium Volunteers, Youth Counselling and youth action in order to develop better partnerships.</div> <bR> <div> Agenda</div> <div> 1 Children's Fund and Volunteer Coordinator Combined Post.</div> <bR> <div> The Committee was requested to ask Joe Green (Treasurer) for finance to support the post, which was finally offered as 7/10 of a full time post, because the income stream was still not clear. Vic was supported in expressing forcibly to grant distributers, the problem of being left in difficulty.</div> <bR> <div> 2 Lynsey said that she and Simon could offer support mechanisms for the new post and asked for information about the work.  </div> <div> The coordinator will ask volunteer groups:</div> <div> Where do young people meet?</div> <div> How often do meetings occur?</div> <div> Is there a current directory?</div> <div> Is there regular support for people in the field?</div> <div> Will there be analysis of learning and development?</div> <div> Where gaps are noted how will these be filled ? (through Connexions?</div> <div> Richard Stowell said he saw the role as one to meet and learn from the voluntary group and help plan new strategies to comply with a more official</div> <div> overview of voluntary groups. The idea is to strengthen the bottom and allow views to be heard at the decision - making level.  Struggling groups need to have a voice.</div> <bR> <div> RVA suggested an induction was necessary and should include: meeting key figures, gaining access to information (need to be checked for accuracy),making contact with No5 (Youth Counselling) and possibly meeting elected members.</div> <bR> <bR> <div> Joe said he needed details for the bank accounts.  The Charity Aid Foundation required a quarterly report. Deb as the vice chair agreed to be the 4<FONT SIZE="1" COLOR="#000000" FACE="Trebuchet MS" >th</FONT> signatory.</div> <bR> <div> 2 Joe noted that the Government of the South East (GOSE) was no longer going to be a funding source for MV.  The funding switch was more straight forward in Wokingham and Bracknell (than Reading?) .  Joe intended to make enquiries.  Chris asked to receive final documents on Borough's report seconded by Debbie, Karen, Richard and Lynsey.</div> <bR> <div> <B>3 Children's Fund Progress-£1.355 million over 3 years.</B></div> <div> This is for support to Coley, Southcote, Amersham Road and Newtown and PAs in Highdown and Blessed Hugh Faringdon Schools. The Government has insisted that there is a link with the Youth Offending Team and the Children' Fund. There should be support in helping with the transition from Primary to secondary school, in community working with youth services so that senior youth workers are available to help workers in voluntary organisations. (Note there will be no support for workers in uniformed groups.) There will be support for blind and partially- sighted people.</div> <bR> <div> 4 Voluntary Sector Support.</div> <div> Irene Cameron has passed the requested information to Vic.  There are a lot of organisations on the list. Some historical grants have a political slant and although they might not be the best ways, at present, for spending money to withdraw funding would require political courage. Richard suggested that one way of encouraging reallocation of funding would be to look at the quality issue.  We represent small groups which usually require moderate funds; large grants go to housing groups.  Richard thought there was a training issue for GLOs.</div> <bR> <div> RBC personnel will process CRB disclosures and Deb will hold the information locally.  This was some disquiet on this.  It was suggested that Readibus might be approached for help in resolving problems with testing drivers for minibuses.</div> <bR> <div> <I>5 Reading Youth Forum</I></div> <div> UKYF rep is Tom Beaumont from Highdown and Amerdeep Kainth is the deputy from Reading Girls' School.</div> <div> The committee was asked to explore the possibility of a young person to head up LMC of Connexions in Reading. Further development of the youth forum with links to school Councils  is planned.</div> <bR> <div> <I>6 RBC Training</I></div> <div> RBC will be offering training to the voluntary sector.</div> <bR> <div> 7 Vic noted that he did not wish to be a signatory on the bank account as there was a conflict of interest. There was no other business and the meeting closed at 2pm.  The date of the next meeting the AGM will be Thursday 10th July and the meeting will take place from 12-2pm at South Street.</div> <bR> <div> Alison Steedman </div> <div> 9 June 2003</div> <bR> <bR> <bR> <bR> <bR> </td> </tr></table></body>