Community
Cohesion Unit
Aims and Objectives
To promote a cohesive community where:
- There is a common vision and a sense of belonging
for all communities;
- The diversity of people’s different backgrounds
and circumstances are appreciated and positively valued;
- Those from different backgrounds have similar life
opportunities; and strong and positive relationships
are being developed between people from different
backgrounds in the workplace, in schools and within
neighbourhoods.
Our aim is to develop the Government’s community
cohesion agenda. To integrate and deliver public services
at both:
- A local level, by working with local authorities,
local strategic partnerships, voluntary and community
business sectors, and local communities
- A national level working with other Government departments.
The work of the Community Cohesion
Unit
The CCU divides its work primarily into 2 main strands.
Firstly, this involves the review of government policy,
which is assisted by the Community Cohesion Panel and
its practitioner groups. These groups include housing,
press and media, regeneration, education to name a few
and are made up of individuals independent of government,
whose practical knowledge of specific policy areas and
local issues is used to analyse policy and to make proposals
that are considered by the ministerial group.
Secondly, encouraging and facilitating new learning
through the Community Cohesion Pathfinder Programme.
This was launched in April 2003 and has been aimed at
building real life examples of areas that are getting
community cohesion right.
The ongoing objectives for the programme include:
- Identifying innovative approaches to promoting community
cohesion;
- Identifying any barriers to community cohesion;
- Developing learning groups and building organisational
capacity and expertise in community cohesion;
- Making recommendations for how resources are best
organised to support the processes and disseminating
information nationally.
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