The Board of West Yorkshire ICB have set out 7 agreed principles that should underpin the way we work with the Third Sector.
These are outlined in a letter from Kim Shutler (who is West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board (WYICB) Sector Lead for the VCSE, and Senior Responsible Officer (SRO) for Power of Communities) and Jonathan Webb, (Director of Finance/Deputy Chief Executive of the WYICB).
You are encouraged to use this letter in conversations with NHS commissioners to highlight the commitment to the 7 agreed principles. Please feed back if this has been useful or not, so that we at Forum Central and Kim Shutler can use it to evidence our third sector experiences.
Read the full letter: VCSE Sector Update – 31.05.24 pdf
The letter contains a summary of actions agreed, current position and proposed next steps. It asks all Places to consider and implement the following recommendations:
- review the seven agreed actions (detailed below), specifically those to be taken forward by each Place which could mitigate against immediate risk to VCSE delivery;
- in line with the Memorandum of Understanding held between the ICB and VCSE, work collaboratively with VCSE infrastructure organisations, VCSE leads and local providers to ensure an open and collaborative dialogue to mitigate the risk to people and communities particularly in the event of disinvestment plans; and
- consider the aggregated disinvestment decisions at a Place level to fully establish the impact on communities, the VCSE and delivery partners/providers.
A briefing from each place will be used to inform this item for discussion at the September meeting of the WYICB.
Leeds Health and Care Partnership – Our ‘Place’ Response and Actions
In Leeds, led by Third Sector colleagues, we have agreed a Third Sector Strategy. In response to these and in line with the Healthy Leeds Plan, the ICB in Leeds is doing a piece of work across the summer to develop a Market Position Statement. This will describe how the ICB in Leeds will apply the 7 principles in the way it contracts and awards grants. It will also describe the priorities and opportunities over the medium-term on the basis of West Yorkshire and Leeds Health & Care Partnership priorities to enable colleagues to be planning further forward. It will also seek to articulate the constraints and limits.
Much of the current funding in the sector in Leeds by the ICB is often for the provision of services. Whilst opportunities in this area will continue, the statement will also signal a move to a greater focus in inequalities and communities (both geographical and of interest) to support the priorities in the Healthy Leeds Plan, with a strong emphasis on outcomes and secondary prevention, access, and early identification of disease. We will also include how over the next few years we work to streamline relationships between LCC and the NHS, and across the NHS. There are a number of conversations happening around this at the moment and a workshop with a collection of Third Sector partners is happening on the 4th of July, with wider conversations with more detail later in the summer.
The Seven Principles and Agreed Actions
- develop a Place level picture of health & care VCSE sector investment;
- develop and agree principles for a risk-based approach that moves away from short-term contracts to longer term sustainable investment to enable innovation and transformation and prioritises social value;
- develop an action plan to mitigate against the risk to diverse grass roots VCSE organisations which may be disproportionately affected by financial pressures but are carrying out essential health inequalities and health creation work including reviewing local mechanisms to ensure funding is reaching these areas;
- develop and agree principles for strategy to shift investment closer to communities including to communities themselves to support early help and prevention;
- provide greater flexibility in use of funding already allocated to VCSE organisations and consider grant/contract renegotiation in the light of a lack of uplifts;
- minimise re-tendering processes where possible – saving staff time to focus on
delivery; and - plan and communicate regarding re-commissioning services and explore contract extension.
