• Healthwatch Herefordshire Consultation
• New Directions - Improving Healthcare Services in South East Powys
• Information and Consultation Strategy for Carers
• POVA Pack
• Communities First is changing from April 2012
• Children in Wales Consultations
• Comments from PAVO consultation events

Healthwatch is shortly being launched in England to champion improvements in health and social care services. Herefordshire Council is now planning how Healthwatch Herefordshire should be set up, ready to start in April 2013.

The views of stakeholders and the public are important to them in the planning, and so hope you will take part in their consultation which runs until 25 October 2013. The questionnaire is available online on their website - www.herefordshire.gov.uk/healthwatch/

For more information call 01432 38 3535 or email involve@herefordshire.gov.uk

Powys teaching Health Board has opened a public consultation on improving healthcare services in South East Powys following its public engagement exercise in 2011.

A consultation document is available online at www.powysthb.wales.nhs.uk or in libraries and town councils across South East Powys.

Public meetings will be held on

8 October 2012           Hay on Wye County Primary School

9 October 2012           Clarence Hall, Crickhowell

11 October 2012        Talgarth Town Hall

17 October 2012      Main Hall, Llandrindod Wells High School

18 October 2012        Bishops Bevan Hall, Brecon

All meetings will begin at 6.30pm. Additional informal drop-in meetings will be publicised on the Powys teaching Health Board website shortly.

This consultation closes on 30 November 2012. Please submit any responses by this date using the form that can be found in the centre of the consultation document.

Please note this is a second version of the information and Consultation Strategy for Carers and there are lots of gaps, highlighted areas and work that needs to be taken forward.   All comments to:

Wendy Morgan, Head of Quality & Safety Unit, Bwrdd Iechyd Addysgu Powys/Powys teaching Health Board, Y Plasty/Mansion House, Bronllys, Powys  LD3 OLS

Ffon/Tel: 01874 712506  Mobile: 07855 046003  

E-bost/Email: wendy.morgan5@wales.nhs.uk

For more information visit Powys Teaching Health Board website.

Communities First will run as a Community Focused programme supporting the Welsh Government’s Anti-Poverty Agenda. It will support the most disadvantaged people in the most deprived areas with the aim of contributing to alleviating persistent poverty. Focused on community-supported actions, it will work alongside other programmes to narrow the education, skills, economic and health gaps between the most deprived and more affluent areas of Wales. In relation to education and skills, the focus will be on supporting work that will ultimately improve the employability of individuals.

A recent consultation documents Communities First – the Future, set out new ways of working and outlined programme changes. Final guidance and an application process for this new programme are likely to be issued by Welsh Government in December. To be ready to take advantage and apply for inclusion, to identify opportunities that Communities First can create to help enhance what we are already delivering and gap fill areas of need we would like to address.

Please take the time to give us brief information in relation to the key questions on the Service survey attached. We will use this information to help map hotspots of need in Powys and begin to identify Communities First interventions that can help. 

"Allows a cross section of opinions to be examined and put forward"

"The opportunity to hear the views of other people and to realise that there is a consensus on some issues."

"Sharing other volunteers' experiences and views."

"An ability to network and learn more about the pressures and problems in common."