Near Neighbours

Summary

This has been a very difficult year for many community groups and leaders. The restrictions of lockdown, plus the added caring responsibilities and personal griefs that have come as a result, have greatly reduced people’s capacity to meet and come together for the benefit of their community. And yet, the need has significantly increased as people have suffered isolation, anxiety and financial hardship as a result of the pandemic.

Throughout this time, Near Neighbours has continued to work in close partnership with faith and community leaders and community groups to support them to adjust, continue and grow their important work. Coordinators have focused on supporting local Covid-response work, helping community leaders to respond to issues and uncertainties in their community arising from the pandemic, supporting small groups and organisations to apply for and secure grants, continuing to develop their partnerships and local networks, and running online events and training sessions in response to local needs and opportunities.

As this report show, despite the difficulties of the past twelve months, we have succeeded in meeting all targets set at the start of this year. We have developed 472 new partnerships, mentored 400 projects, distributed 122 small grants, and held 163 leadership training events.

As a team, we are greatly looking forward to restrictions easing and community activity resuming in person. We will continue to support our partners to deliver their valuable work and respond to the long-term effects of the pandemic in their communities.

1. Local Hubs

Throughout this past year, Near Neighbours’ eleven local hubs and coordinators have been active in building interfaith and community partnerships, strengthening community leadership, and feeding into wider integration initiatives. This work has been more important than ever given the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, its particular impact on ethnic minority communities, and the isolation people have experienced. Much work carried out in the last quarter has focused on helping small community groups in their Covid-response work and also in adapting their activities to move online where possible.

Across our programme regions, 140 new partnerships were initiated in the final quarter, which means a total of 472 new partnerships over the whole year (see table below). Green denotes exceeded targets.

	Q1 actual	Q2 actual	Q3 actual	Q4 Actual	Total	Year Targets
New partnerships initiated	104	104	124	140	472	180
Projects mentored or supported	103	97	97	103	400	200
Volunteers mobilised	234	101	833	396	1,564	N/A
New volunteers recruited	121	43	157	56	377	N/A
Volunteer hours	3,102	483	29,913	13,215	46,713	N/A

Partnership working has encompassed building relationships with churches, mosques, synagogues, other places of worship, voluntary sector organisations, Local Authorities, statutory agencies, and schools and colleges.

Highlights include:

In Birmingham, the Near Neighbours Coordinator partnered with Birmingham Mind to run online wellbeing sessions for community leaders. The sessions offered people a chance to talk about how they were doing in the pandemic and to connect with others. They showed how important it will be to continue supporting community leaders post-pandemic as many of them are tired and worn down after a difficult year.
In the Black Country, the Coordinator introduced the BAME Coordinator of the Equality and Diversity NHS Black Country and the Lead Vaccination Nurse for the area. As a result, a series of webinars has been run to raise awareness of the importance of people getting their Covid vaccinations.
In Greater Manchester, the Coordinator worked in partnership with Bury Council to organise an information event for Muslim and Jewish doctors and faith leaders in the area. Vaccination take-up rates were particularly low in these communities, but as a result of the event many faith institutions decided to host vaccination pop-up centers.
In Leicester, the Coordinator partnered with Afro Innovation Group, many of whose clients are on zero-hours contracts, to deliver the “Covid Cash Recovery Course”. Afro Innovation recruited participants for the course and Near Neighbours collaborated with Together Leicester to deliver it. One participant commented afterwards: ”It was good. I enjoy every part of it. Especially the money saving tips”.
In East London, Near Neighbours has been focused on supporting groups who have received grant funding and thinking how they can adjust their activities and run them online if possible. They also ran an online event to celebrate International Women’s day that included dance, meditation session and a poetry piece about young people and mental health. Women really enjoyed the event and in their feedback said they need more events like these for celebration and reflection.
In Luton, the Coordinator worked closely with faith and community leaders to resolve tensions about hospital visiting restrictions following some unpleasant events where police had been called. Near Neighbours took an active role in facilitating conversations and guiding responses and their contribution was recognised in a letter from the Chief Nurse wrote saying; “We are very grateful for your support in following the agreed line of communication across your faith networks.”
In Nottingham, the Coordinator has been able to build strong relationships with nine organisations through the Leadership for Effective Change programme. As a result of this, a partnership between the Vine Community Centre and a number of the participants in the training course developed and they are now working together to support refugees and asylum seekers, providing dance classes to community groups, promoting training programmes and joining together to apply for funding for Windrush projects.
In Peterborough, the Coordinator was given a Civic Award in recognition of the contribution of the local Near Neighbours hub to the community. The media coverage of the award led to further organisations making contact, three of which (Peterborough Samaritans, Families First and CPLearning trust) ended up applying for and receiving small grants to support their Covid-response work.
In West Yorkshire, International Women’s Day gave the Coordinator an opportunity to connect women from different groups together on a zoom call to share the Tides of Change poem. This meeting and others have led to long-term partnerships and there is now a really good network of groups that connect up as needs be to facilitate or initiate. After the event, the Coordinator reflected “I think women felt heard by each other, I think they felt less alone after the event and importantly validated for their life experiences.”

In the final quarter of this year, Near Neighbours has mobilised 396 volunteers, including 56 new volunteers. For the whole year this means Near Neighbours has mobilised a total of 1,564 volunteers, including 377 new volunteers, and has facilitated a total of 46,713 volunteer hours.

2. Small Grants Programme

A further 37 small grants have been awarded in the last quarter which means that, in total, 122 grants have been given out through the Near Neighbours small grants programme between October 2020 and March 2021, significantly exceeding our target of awarding 90 small grants. A total of £243,049 has been awarded to small, local voluntary and faith groups.

Based on the available applicant data for this grant cycle, the demographics of application leads are as follows:

Ethnicity: 30% English / Welsh / Scottish / Northern Irish, 11% African, 9% Indian, 8% Pakistani, 6% Caribbean, 6% Bangladeshi, 4% White and Black Caribbean, 13% other [plus various others at smaller percentages]
Immigrant generation: 62% born in the UK, 37% born outside the UK, 1% prefer not to say
Age group: 16% aged 16-30, 42% aged 31-45, 27% aged 46-60, 13% aged 61+, 2% prefer not to say
Gender: 66% female, 32% male, 2% prefer not to say
Faith: 48% Christian, 22% Muslim, 14% no religion, 4% prefer not to say, 3% Buddhist, 2% Hindu, 2% Sikh, 4% other
Disability: 16% living with a disability or long-term health condition
Employment: 43% working full-time, 31% working part-time, 7% retired, 4% note working due to illness/health/on sick leave, 3% looking after children, 2% unemployed

Data from the current cohort of grant applicants indicates that NN is reaching a highly diverse group of people, across all demographic indicators. This reflects the strength of NN Coordinators’ relationships across a wide range of community groups. By providing mentorship and support to these individuals, building their skills in applying for grants, and supporting the implementation of successful applicants, NN is increasing the diversity of civil society at the grassroots level.

The number of individuals directly engaged through the grants programme is 14,030, thereby exceeding our target of engaging 10,000 people. Furthermore, the average turnaround time for a grant application was just nine days, meaning we more than achieved our target of reducing the turnaround time from three weeks to two weeks. Grants have been awarded across all five themes of the programme, as can be seen in the table below.

	Total number of grants awarded per theme	Proportion of total grant awards per theme*
Group 1: Solving divisions & tensions	22	18%
Group 2: Promoting connectedness	110	90%
Group 3: Working with marginalised women and girls	32	26%
Group 4: Working with vulnerable young people	32	26%
Group 5: Combating loneliness	57	47%
TOTAL GRANTS awarded:	122
TARGET:	90

*some appear in more than one category

Grants awarded in this final quarter included an online celebration event for International Women’s Day in Luton, a free after-school club to be held once a week in West London, a cross-cultural participatory music programme in East London, and a series of workshops/seminars about discrimination, prejudice, unconscious bias, community-building, media coverage and Black Lives Matter in the Black Country.

We received the following comments from completed impact reports:

“The group taking part are very marginalised in the community, this project gave them a place of contact and inclusion.”
“The project has given a chance to women from community to recognise, acknowledge and own their stories. These stories are those of challenges faced by many and, once shared, will only amplify their voices, spread awareness and help to create positive changes.”
“One participant told us that this was the first time they really engaged in the community after a long period of being isolated and afraid to engage with the community due to past experiences.”
“We are most grateful that we received this funding as it helped us to kick start a great initiative in very challenging times”
“The first time of running an event on Zoom was a big challenge but we gained in confidence and had good technical support which relieved the stress.”
“A fantastic project with plenty of engagement, learning new activities, making new friends and lifting the profile of our charity in the local community.”

3. Leaders Training Programme

A further 34 leadership training events were held in the last quarter, which means that a total of 163 events have been held by Near Neighbours over this last year, 98 of which directly challenged intolerance and extremism. 58% of participants were women; 29% were young people – exceeding our targets in both areas.

	Q1 actual	Q2 actual	Q3 actual	Q4 actual	Total	Proportions	Targets
Leadership Training Events	33	50	46	34	163		N/A
Leadership Training Events – Challenging Intolerance and Extremism	18	35	33	12	98	67%	N/A
Attendees of Leadership Training Events	2,855	1,003	1,217	1,156	6,286		1,750
Female Attendees of Leadership Training Events	1,464	634	653	952	3,695	59%	50%
Young Attendees of Leadership Training Events	1,474	88	137	131	1,815	29%	25%

Examples of leadership events include: in Newham, faith leaders involved in food banks in Manor Park were brought together to further develop their joint working; in Wolverhampton, an event was chaired by Near Neighbours which brought together the police, Manchester Metropolitan University, Gender Equality and others to raise awareness of local gender-based violence; and in East London, a justice and leadership programme was held for young Pentecostal leaders, in connection with a leadership course which supports young Muslim leaders.

Due to the national lockdown, we have only been able to run one Catalyst programme for young leaders in the whole year. This was held in October 2020 in collaboration with the Somali Bravanese Welfare Association in Barnet (West London hub) and included 15 participants. Further Catalyst courses will be held as soon as lockdown restrictions ease.

Data from our participant surveys of our informal leaders events reveal the following outcomes for people benefitting from NN leadership events across the year:

46% said “I learned something new about a culture or religion different to mine” (target >50%)
34% said “I had a conversation with someone of a different ethnicity or faith that I didn’t already know” (target >50%)
52% said “I feel more confident that I can make a difference in my community” (target >60%)

These are positive indicators of learning, conversation, and growth in confidence. The fact that the indicator around conversations is lower than the annual targets is related to the reality of transitioning all programming online: many informal occasions to connect at events (before the official start, during breaks, at lunch) are missed when the events are delivered online, and, in addition, people feel that they do not really “meet “ other people online, as they do in person.

However, the outcomes are much better for the Leadership for Effective Change programme that we piloted in q4. This was six week online course where the same people met over several weeks and made much deeper relationships, and there was a much deeper impact in terms of confidence to make changes.

Data from these events said:

96.97% of participants said they ‘had a conversation with somebody from a different faith’ that they didn’t already know.
100% of participants stated that they ‘had a conversation with somebody from a different ethnicity’ that they didn’t already know.
100% of people ‘Agreed’ or ‘Strongly Agreed’ that the training ‘equipped them to take action to improve their community’.

Leadership for Effective Change

Leadership for Effective Change (LEC) is a training programme that brings people together to learn community leadership skills. The programme began in 2021 as a pilot in three areas (Manchester, Nottingham and West London) and the aim of the programme was to equip local people and organisations to develop and act to address local issues – developing leadership skills through developing and acting, including Covid-19 responses and targeting under-represented communities. This would build the capacity of people in areas of socio-economic disadvantage and low civic engagement.

A total of 36 people participated in this pilot over six weeks.

The demographics of participants are as follows:

10 different ethnic groups
¾ of the participants from ethnic minority backgrounds
88.89% Female
66.67% Never attended a Leadership Course before

Following the training sessions:

49% of participants strongly agreed that the course had prepared them to take a more active leadership role in their community
52% strongly agreed that it had equipped them to work together with others in their community
And 91% agreed to some extent that the course had motivated them to volunteer in their community

When participants were asked what learning they took from this training, some said: “That I have the ability to lead – I just needed the tools”; “The power of sharing our story and journeys and listening to others”; “How to make sure that we are listening to the issues”.

Stories of Hope

Near Neighbours ran six events themed around ‘Stories of Hope’.[1] The events were designed to allow local faith and community leaders to talk about their experiences of living through the Covid-19 Pandemic and the impact this has had on their communities, and how they have responded. The planning for these events began in December 2020 and the events were executed in February and March 2021.

Each of the sessions was run online (on Zoom), lasted 90 minutes and was facilitated to make them interactive and allow for participants to stay engaged and interested. Each session focused on: the challenges faced locally under the pandemic; any benefits/positives that came out of the pandemic; how local people see the immediate future of their neighbourhoods; and ideas of how the people taking part could support one another/work together to improve things.

Location of Events	Date	Residents	Facilitators/Organisers
Black Country	4 February	19	4
East London	5 February	26	4
Peterborough	11 February	18	3
Bradford	16 February	18	4
Nottingham	16 February	13	4
Manchester	8 March	14	4
National (with MHCLG)	25 March	18
TOTAL RESIDENTS INVOLVED:		109

In total, we brought over 120 local people (leaders and activists) together, showing the appetite and need for such discussions. The issues raised were honest and touching – full of both pain and hope. Participants valued having a space where they could be heard, find fellow travellers who had been struggling as they had, as well as recharge and replenish their energies to continue providing support to others. For all the pain that we heard, there were also powerful and energising stories of hope that participants brought into the conversation, including:

Support services tackling tough concerns such as mental health, domestic violence, loneliness and suicide
Places of worship opening their doors and becoming vaccine centres; faith and community leaders going above and beyond their remit to step in and help where they could
Contributions of local faith groups in tackling food insecurity, feeding the needy, running food banks and tackling the problematic framing of the ‘deserved / undeserved poor’
Listening to people, hearing about pre-existing inequalities, such as housing conditions and overcrowding, but providing optimism and hope to help people through these difficult times
Raising awareness of Covid rules, encouraging vaccination and tackling some of the conspiracies and myths around the Pandemic, including in local community languages.
Imparting digital awareness skills and using this to tackle isolation especially amongst the elderly, but also more widely in the community.
Collaborative efforts going forward – building new relationships, joint fundraising, greater efforts to use the new relationships built during the pandemic

One participant reminded us of an old English word ‘respair’, meaning the return of hope after a period of despair. This was a powerful way of capturing the mood of these workshops.

We then brought two people from each group, from diverse backgrounds, to meet with MHCLG staff online, and to feed back to them their concerns, hopes and actions. This was very powerful and moving. It was clear that people were stepping up to meet the challenges they faced.

Near Neighbours Communications

Between January and March 2021, Near Neighbours activities on social media and online communications have registered an exceptional peak, mainly due to the promotion of social media adverts and videos for the Surge programme (including public health, social distancing and vaccination advice). For example, we had 181,200 impressions and 764 mentions on Twitter (in comparison to 81,200 and 547 in the previous quarter), and a reach of 10,300 people, with 647 engagements, on Facebook (in comparison to 7,400 and 434 engagements in the previous quarter). The website had 12,000 unique visitors, and 33,000 page views (a major increase in comparison to the previous quarter, with 9,900 visitors and 23,000 page views). This was mainly due to the Covid Community Relief Grants page, which received more than 8,000 visits (with more than 1,000 downloads of the grant criteria and 736 downloads of the application forms).

During this time, we published four blog stories including a moving testimony from a Muslim lady involved in some of our local projects about her experience with Covid-19. We also sent two newsletters, one in January, that was delivered to 3,668 people (with a 47.5% open rate), and one in March, delivered to 3,899 people (with a 33.6% open rate). New subscribers are regularly joining via the form on our website and social media campaigns, and we have now 3,968 subscribers (against a target of 2,000).

Local coordinators have been active in promoting their events on social media, and through local channels (community groups, leaflets, radios). Particularly successful were the activities for International Women’s Day (with the launch of Nisa-Nashim local group in Greater Manchester and other events organised in Manchester, Luton, Birmingham and London).

[1] These events took place instead of Real People Honest Talk which could not take place due to the pandemic