At Community Catalysts we believe passionately that everyone should be able to live their lives in the way they want to as connected and contributing citizens.
Year-on-year we focus on making this vision a reality for people who draw on care and support.
2023-24 was no exception. We delivered more projects than last year – a total of 59 across our programmes, which reached more people. We continued to work with partners across the health and care sector to push for change that will benefit us all, and enable everyone to live their vision of a good life.
In the last 12 months we have:
In this report we set out some of the great things we have achieved. We have set it out against 4 key themes that we believe are important in making this possible.
So what difference have we made over 2023-24?
Our work results in people having more choice and control over their care and support, which means that people can live at home for longer, stay connected to their communities and choose the right support at the right time for them.
Giving people choice and control over the support they may need and access to the right information enables people to stay as well as possible, maintain independence and caring roles for longer.
Care and Support Statutory Guidance, 2024.
In partnership with Hertfordshire County Council, as part of embedding community micro-enterprises within the core care offer, we worked closely with the direct payment support provider. This ensured local people had more control of their own care and support by being able to use their direct payment in a creative way through community micro-enterprises.
Watch the following video to hear from some of the micro-enterprises that are providing creative care and support in Hertfordshire. The direct payment manager at the council also talks about the value of community micro-enterprises to people in the local community.
We saw similar success in Worcestershire, where our programme in partnership with the County Council supported 165 local people to set up and run their own small community enterprises offering help for older or disabled people in their homes or through community-based opportunities.
Watch a short clip of Carly Rees, social worker at Worcestershire County Council, speak about how we helped the council to offer creative and cost-effective support options to people:
We provided evidence and learning to the Welsh Government that was published in a report on micro-care services engagement. This formed part of its first stage of policy development on micro-enterprise services. It included some key insights:
We continue to work with the Welsh government to shape policy for the benefit of citizens.
Our work helps prevent, reduce and delay the reliance on public services. By walking alongside people, and supporting them to draw on their talents, as well as the strengths of their local community, we take the pressure off the system.
Local approaches to prevention should be built on the resources of the local community.
The Care Act 2014
This year a significant NIHR-funded piece of research was released to show the life changing impact of Local Area Coordination for people and communities. It was also the first ever multi-site evaluation of the approach in England and Wales.
The research found that Local Area Coordination builds trusting relationships, strengthens community connections and improves people’s overall wellbeing. The approach enables people to share their gifts, strengths and skills and to connect and contribute to their local community and reduces the need for formal care. It also prevents crises by ensuring people are guided through the system and receive the support they need.
It was produced in partnership with the Universities of Hull, Sheffield, York, Exeter, and Leeds.
Watch Glynn’s story to understand the difference Local Area Coordination makes to people’s lives:
We put people before systems. Our work results in people, who need care and support, shaping their own lives by getting the opportunities to be heard, and contribute their skills and talents.
We want to move from a system which can still feel like it is led by professionals to one in which care and support is coproduced with the people who draw on it and which realises the right to self-directed support.
ADASS Roadmap, ‘A Time to Act’
The Big Conversation is a Community Catalysts approach which provides a space for people to share their experiences and coproduce action plans for change at a strategic or service level.
In partnership with Our Voice and Nottinghamshire County Council we facilitated a Big Conversation which included the voices of 542 people: 277 unpaid carers and 265 people who draw on social care.
These conversations informed the creation of the council’s adult social care strategy.
The Big Conversation has been a guiding force in the co-design of Nottinghamshire County Council’s new Local account for Adult Social Care. The Local Account sets out where we are and what we need to do to improve.
We have been working in partnership with national community equipment provider Medequip to develop the Equipment Matters coproduction group. The aim is to shake up the community equipment scene.
Activity over the year has resulted in the group:
The group continues to promote a ‘nothing about us without us’ coproduction approach within an equipment context.
I use a range of equipment…having the right equipment, equipment that works well is really important to me. It can change a person’s life, it changed my life.
Equipment Matters group member
Our work improves the quality of people’s lives and their communities. Not only do we provide a greater choice of services and supports, but we improve lives by creating new businesses, jobs and keep money in the local economy.
Social care is not only about ‘services’: it is about having a life.
Adult Social Care Committee
Kent County Council was awarded bronze for Community Focus and silver for Procurement in the iESE Public Sector Transformation Awards for the great impact that the project is having for people who draw on health and social care. It also increased the value of business and community.
By April of this year, we supported 125 micro-enterprises that are currently helping 660 people to have a good life. These enterprises are hugely varied, offering care and support in the home, and exciting and inclusive support and activities outside the home.
We continued to play a key part in shaping the Social Care Future campaign to highlight the need for a reimagination and redesign of the way social care is thought about and delivered across the UK.
We contributed to its outline programme for the next government and have been actively involved in steps to fix the ‘plumbing and wiring’ of adult social care. We look forward to working with partners to make this happen.
Working in partnership, we will continue to deliver high quality work in pursuit of our vision for everyone in the UK to be able to live a good life. We will continue to change the shape of local communities for the better, and work with our new government and partners across the sector to influence policy and practice at a national level for the benefit of all.
We look forward with hope. We know what good looks like and will continue to strive to make this a reality.
Thank you to our partners and all those who have supported and championed our work over this past year.