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The Government is considering extending the Connexions brand to cover integrated youth support services.

The proposal is contained in a Department for Education and Skills document examining the issues local authorities will face when they take responsibility for information, advice and guidance services in April 2008.

Connexions Brand Guidelines for Local Authorities raises the possibility of "considering the potential for widening the scope of the brand to cover other youth support services".

The Association of Principal Youth and Community Officers has expressed concerns at the plans, in a response to the department. Susie Roberts, chief executive of the association, said she was worried that tying services in too closely with Connexions would deter young people.

A new Volunteer Driver's Handbook from Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA) sets out to ensure the safety of the drivers and their passengers, and highlights the driver's duties and legal responsibilities.

Voluntary organisations can request complimentary printed copies by email: dvernon@rospa.com, or download in pdf format, 269kb, from http://www.rospa.com/roadsafety/info/volunteer_drivers.pdf.

Apprenticeships in Youth work - a free focus group event sharing experience and review of the youth work apprenticeship programme in England, 22nd May 2007 11.00 - 3.30pm at The National Youth Agency, Leicester

This is a joint event from the National Council for Voluntary Youth Services and the National Youth Agency, which will be of interest to existing training providers delivering the youth work apprenticeship programme, employers who recruit apprentices and national bodies such as the DfES, LLUK and LSC.

The voluntary youth sector plays an invaluable role in the delivery of services to young people. But is its contribution all too often overlooked, asks Jo Stephenson.

The Youth Matters green paper promised to put the voluntary sector at the heart of delivering new and improved services for young people. But nearly two years on and voluntary organisations - big and small - still feel that they are struggling for recognition.

read the rest here - link to Young People Now

This from Young People Now

Peterborough City Council has merged its youth and Connexions service to create an integrated young people's service.

The council hopes to call the new organisation Connexions Peterborough Young People's Service, but Rachel Rouncefield, head of integrated young people's service, said it has to get permission from the Department for Education and Skills.

The new service, which came into effect last week, will comprise three locality teams, made up of community-based youth workers, universal personal advisers, intensive personal advisers and positive activities key workers. Some of the teams will also include teenage pregnancy workers, specialist youth workers and minority ethnic new arrival link workers.

Have a look at Youth Clubs Hampshire and IoW's excellent programme of training - available to all at a very reasonable cost. Brochure here

The County Council have removed £265,000 from their community education budget. This money was specifically used to subsidise the use of school premises by voluntary and community groups.

Very strong representations were made to the Leader of the County Council about this cut. It was predicted that the result would be that small groups would be priced out of the schools. It was feared that for many there would be no alternative - and this could see the closure of the group. In some cases it would mean that poorer families would not be able to afford increased fees.

The full results of nfpSynergy's annual Virtual Promise survey tracking charities' use of, and attitudes to, the internet have been published for 2006.

Consisting of loads of graphs, the pdf (804kb) can be found via the Reports section on http://www.nfpsynergy.net

Background
The development of the Common Assessment Framework (CAF) can be traced back to The Victoria Climbie Inquiry (The Laming Report), which made a number of recommendations to Government in order to improve protection for children.

The recommendations included the need for Local Authorities to:

"Establish reliable ways of assessing the needs and circumstances of children in their area..."

The CAF has been developed for use by practitioners in all organisations so that they can communicate and work more effectively together.

The National Youth Agency has published the 'Local authority youth services annual audit 2005-06'.

This is an opportunity to see how Hampshire measures up against other local authorities.