An

nu

al

Rev

iew

2016

-17

Improving the lives of Minority Ethnic Communities

I am very happy to introduce the Forum’s annual review report for the year 2016-17. The past year was another challenging year during the financial austerity when we saw a significant increase in the demand for our services due to a huge number of the BME people settling in our area, particularly from the Middle-East and EU coun-tries. With our very limited resources we supported our vulnerable clients. The Forum continued to serve the needs of the BME communities by providing a range of services such as:-

Maintaining a focal point to provide a one-stop-shop service

Providing training and employability programmes to improve the job prospect of the BME people

Provide advocacy services on education, training, housing, benefit, health and various other matters

Support children and young people to improve their educational attainment and help to gain con-fidence and raising their self-esteem

Providing various social, health, leisure and recrea-tional activities to the BME older people to reduce their isolation and health wellbeing

This report highlights our successful programmes and activities of the past 12 months. Staff, members of man-agement committee and the volunteers worked very hard to run these activities and none of these would have been successful without their dedication and support. I would like to thank all who were involved providing these much needed services to the vulnerable BME communities.

- Harchet Singh Bains, Chairman

Page 2

From the Chair

The past year was very challenging for us as we had an-other tough year with reduced resources yet with a high demand for our services. We have seen a large number of new immigrant communities settling in North Hertford-shire and surrounding areas particularly from the EU countries. People needed our intensive support to deal with their housing, children’s school placement, job, training and benefit issues. In the past year we had suc-cessfully completed a few time-limited project.

We have successfully completed a skills develop-ment project funded by SANTANDER where 75 people learned various employability skills. This helped 15 people to find new jobs who were previ-ously unemployed.

We also had a very busy summer delivering various interactive workshops, multi-sports programme, bootcamp and other extra curriculum activities to the children and young people. A very useful grant from the RO Group through Hertfordshire Commu-nity Foundation helped us to deliver this project which helped 284 children and young people.

I would like to thank our Chair, Mr. Harchet Bains and other trustees for their continuous support and commit-ment to the Forum. I would also thank to all our funders and partners supporting us in providing various resources and services for our clients.

-Mohammed Alam, Director

North Hertfordshire Minority Ethnic Forum

Director’s Statement

466

1791

628

1908

20 25 96 60 293 267152

No. of users 2016-17

Our plan for the year 2016-17 was to provide some life changing support to the black and minority eth-nic communities. All our services were tailored to meet the four outcomes as per our business plan and we have supported:

186 BME people learning new skills through a range of skills development programmes and training leading to increased employment pro-spect.

416 BME people received culturally and linguis-tic sensitive support on housing, benefit, health and various other matters through our information, advice and guidance services .

339 older BME people reduced their social isolation through various social, leisure and recreational activities.

388 children and young people improved confi-dence and academic level through extra cur-riculum activities and educational programmes.

Annual Review 2016-17

People we helped

Page 3

Employability and Skills Development Programmes

Over the past year, the Forum have provided its members with various training and skills development courses. These courses have:

Improved English language skills of 42 women

Improved IT Skills of over 57 people.

45 women learned Dressmaking skills through our regular Sewing classes.

11 people learned Cookery and Food Hygiene skills

15 people completed the First Aid training

7 unemployed people attended a regular Job Club

9 people completed a course of Hair, Henna & Nail Arts workshop

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

1

Employability & Skills Dev. Programme

English Language Courses IT Sewing & Dressmaking Cookery & food Hyegiene

First Aid Training Job Club Hair, Henna & Nail Art

Page 4

Advocacy Service

OPAL consultation with Forum’s clients

38%

16%10%

5%

9%

3%2% 9%

8%

Advocacy Services

Benefit advice

Immigration

Education

Insurance

Health

Driving Licence

Employment

Housing

Others

The Forum maintains an open door policy to provide information, advice and guidance in ethnic languages to help those who can’t speak English. Our support covers benefit, education, training, housing, health and various others matters. We have seen people needing help with various form filling, visa and immigration mat-ters, hospital/doctor appointments, applying for a Blue Badge, free Bus pass and help to communicate with other agencies.

Mr Rai is an old age pensioner who is isolated and living alone at home. Mr Rai has a family home in Hitchin and has two grown up children. Sadly, Mr Rai lost his wife a few years ago. The children have moved away from home.

Mr Rai has been coming to our community resource centre for a very long time. His daily activity con-sists of visiting the Asian men’s elderly social club, playing cards is a favourite game. Due to his lan-guage and communication barriers he relies on us hugely to communicate with various agencies e.g. hospital, doctor’s surgery, local council etc. We pro-vide a lot of intensive support to Mr Rai by making all his appointments and responding to his corre-spondence especially, as English is not his first lan-guage.

Mr Rai has a lot of medical needs due to his long term heart condition and diabetic. He has to visit doctor/nurses frequently for regular check- ups. The forum has created a daily medication sheet for him to tick each day after he takes his medication. This is a very useful resource for Mr Rai to not for-get or take too much medication.

Mr Rai also needs to have his nails cut by the Podia-try nurse. These appointments are made for Mr Rai by a member of staff at the forum.

Recently, Mr Rai vehicle was involved in a hit and run. We spent a lot of time making calls on behalf of Mr Rai. We were making telephone calls to the po-lice, the witness who was involved as well as the in-surance Company. This took up a lot of time with holding on the telephone and completing paperwork.

Mr Rai faces a huge barrier of not having the Eng-lish language and being so isolated he relies heavily for help and support from the North Herts Minority Ethnic Forum. He is very happy with services he re-ceives from the Forum.

28%

59%

13%

Information, Advice & Guidance

Advocacy Information Event Pension services

A Case Study:

Annual Review 2016-17 Page 5

Trip to the Mill Green Museum

Services for the children and young people

Over 436 children and young people were supported during the past year. Support provided in-cludes Maths and English Home Work Club, Polish Language School and French Language School. We have also provided various extra-curriculum activities to help increasing their confidence. In the past year.

60 children and young people improved in Maths and English

68 children and young people learned/improved French language skills

71 children and young people learned/improved Polish Language skills

237 children and young people improved their confidence through extra-curriculum activities

Drugs & alcohol abuse workshop

Boot-Camp during summer holiday

A CASE STUDY:

*Mikhael is a young person, age 14 who recently came to the UK under the government resettlement programme to grant asylum to some refu-gee from the war torn country Syria. He was traumatised due to the country going through the war and crisis. He has come over with his family and now living in Stevenage, Hertfordshire.

Though improving, he still can’t speak good English. Due to this language barrier, he is facing communication difficulties with other children and thus isolated and socially excluded. We run a regular social club for the new Syrian families where he came one day with his parents. We have introduced him to all our activities for the children and young people funded by the Hertfordshire Community Foundation. Since then he has attended our workshop of Drugs & Alcohol, Crime Prevention & ASBO, and healthy cookery courses. He also, along with family, went out on a day trip to visit the Mill Green Museum and Roman Baths. This has cre-ated a chance for him to meet up other Syrian children in similar situa-tion and making new friends. He also made friends with non-Syrian chil-dren and had great fun. His confidence is growing. His parents reported that he is doing very well in his school. Mikhael enjoys Arts & Crafts and participated in our T-shirt printing competition. He drew a picture of his chosen design for his T-shirt. Mikhael was one of the winners chosen by the judges. Mikhael has also shown a great interest in pho-tography and have enrolled in our Digital Photography and Media cours-es to be running for young people in the winter.

*Name changed to hide children’s identity

60 68 71

237

0

50

100

150

200

250

Childrens Services

Support in Math & English Polish School

French School Extra Curriculum Activities

Page 6

Elderly Peoples Services

Senior Asian Men’s Club

Italian Elders Club

Letchworth Italian Elders

Club

Letchworth Polish Elders

Club

Italian Evening Meal Club

Italian Pensioners Club

Rashidi – Women’s Group

Day Trips

We also provided various infor-

mation events to raise the

awareness of the BAME elderly

people on the following topics:

Eye & Hearing Test by NHS

Community Safety Talk

Fire Safety at Home Talk

Tips to live independently

INAS (Istituto Nazionale As-

sistenza Sociale)

FNP (Federation of National

Pensioners for Italians)

Estate Planning Advice

Older Persons Activity,

Learning and Safety.

Elderly Peoples Services:

Our services for the elderly people were aimed to reduce their social isolation and create an opportunity to meet with other peo-ple and make friends. In the past year our:

Social Clubs enabled 145 people to meet regularly

144 joined various meal & luncheon Clubs

50 people regularly attended various health events

A senior citizen getting his Eye-Test done

Information on Estate Planning Italian Luncheon Club

43%

42%

15%

Elderly Peoples Services

Social Clubs

Luncheon Clubs

Other activities includinghealth programmes

Annual Review 2016-17

Accounts 2016-17

Page 7

Trustees Report Charity Name: North Hertfordshire Minority Ethnic Forum Charity Registration No: 1077201 Financial year begins: 1st April Financial year Ends: 31st March Charity principal address: Unity House, Ground Floor, Whinbush Road, Hitchin Hertfordshire SG5 1PH Charity Trusts: Governing Document The Forum became a registered charity on the 27th August 1999. It is gov-erned by a Charity Commission approved Constitution. It is run by a Board of Trustees. Objectives of the Charity To improve the quality of life for local Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) Com-munities by helping them to have an informed voice in the local decision making process. Within this overall objective there are three specific strands 1.Tackling social isolation and needs of older BME people. 2. Helping vulnerable young BME people to gain confidence and help self esteem thereby reducing future disadvantages. 3. Supporting BME people to improve their skills and thereby improving their employability and economic well being. Committee/ Trustees Members The Trustees at the date of this report are as follows: Committee Members Chair Mr Harchet Singh Bains Vice Chair Mr Sanjeev Kumar Secretary Mrs Penny Miah Treasurer Mrs Antonietta Bortone Tinney Member Miss Francesca D’Anna Member Mrs Dorell Haynes Member Mrs Maria Mechelewska Member Mr Gurdev Singh Member Miss Maria Esson

Committee/Trustees Members Selection The North Herts Minority Ethnic Forum holds an Annual General Meeting (AGM) and at the AGM, Committee members/Trustees elect a Chair, Vice Chair, Secretary, and Treasurer and other committee members. New Trustees: Each Trustee is invited to be appointed by the Current Board of Trus-tees, and as such can be dismissed as a Trustee, or asked to resign their position. However this decision can only be ratified by the full consent of the Board of Trus-tees. Policies Reserve Policy Most of the income of the charity is received by the way of a grant, and as such if the grant is stopped then that particular activity will also have to cease, therefore not allowing any funds to become a deficit. The charity does not have any specific restrictions on the amount of reserves needs, however it is generally recognised that no such scheme should be in deficit for any significant amount of time, or without the prospect of future grants being received. The Trustees review the reserves of the charity on a monthly basis. This review encompasses the nature of the income and expenditure streams, the need to match variable income and fixed commitments and the nature of the reserves. This monthly review allows the charity to be managed efficiently and to provide a buffer for unin-terrupted services. Grant Making Policy The North Herts Minority Ethnic Forum aims to serve the needs of BME groups. To facilitate this, the Forum monitors the needs through various consultations with these groups and designs projects to alleviate their needs. Funding is then sought from various agencies and bodies to enable us to implement the projects/ activities. Risk All major risk areas relating to the charity have been reviewed and there are none which are considered to breach the future going concern of the charity.

Unity House, Gr. Floor

Whinbush Road

Hitchin SG5 1PH

North Hertfordshire

Minority Ethnic Forum

Tel: 01462 440224

www.nhmef.org.uk

Staff:

Director: Mohammed Alam

Community Officer Nazma Malik

Administrator: Rafida Alhagiali

Volunteers (Admin):

Christine Pascoe

Shoeab Choudhry

Thanks We would like to thank everybody that has supported the North Herts Minority Ethnic

Forum in our work, including all our partners, funders, all past and present Committee

members, staff and volunteers.

In Partnership with:

Our future: Our vision for the future is to build on our existing services, set up projects and activities to cater for new demands of the BME communities. To achieve this goal we would like to:

Maintain a focal point, our Community Resource Centre for the BME communities

Continue supporting the BME communities to improve their skills to enhance their employment prospect.

Support BME women to improve their confidence, self-esteem and skills.

Help vulnerable young BME people to gain confidence and help self-esteem thereby reducing future disadvantage.

Support underachieving BME children to improve their educational attainment.

Tackle the disproportionate social and economic exclusion experienced by BME communities.

Help the BME communities to have an informed voice in the local decision making process and

Work towards community cohesion to build a safer and sustainable society