1st Annual Assembly Conference Report

Brian Carr, Chief Executive of BVSC, welcomed all attendees to the conference. He explained that the first section of day had been organised in a chat show format, with various guests joining him on the stage.

He said that the Assembly's made some considerable achievements over the past year including a consultation event on Day Services Modernisation. In addition, an engagement event on the Local Area Agreement resulted in a 'thriving sector indicator' being adopted as a local indicator. The Third Sector Assembly (TSA) has also developed a position paper on worklessness.

Be Birmingham has also recognised the TSA as the channel for engagement with the third sector and there is Considerable interest nationally in the Assembly as a model for good practice, Phil Hope, Minister for the Third Sector, was interested to hear about it. The TSA has secured a 5-year BASIS grant from the Big Lottery Fund to continue its work of taking forward the thematic networks and formalizing the network champions as accountable third sector representatives.