GM Live Well: Growing great everyday support in every neighbourhood

This is the fourth event planned as part of Greater Manchester’s National Lottery funded programme of movement building, learning and accelerator work (in Bolton, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford and Tameside). It follows the launch in February 2024, an event focused on community wealth building in May 2024, and a community power event in October 2024.

It will bring together our Voluntary Community, Faith and Social Enterprise partners, Local Authorities, NHS, funders, and more to explore the journey we have been on since the 2021 Live Well Mayoral manifesto commitment, celebrate our achievements, share, learn and importantly progress as we take our neighbourhood and prevention work to the next level through GM Live Well.

We hope to galvanise and energise all partners in the next steps of our journey, exploring how Greater Manchester can all build on what we have learnt, sustainably invest in, and do, community led health and wellbeing to tackle health, social and economic inequalities.

Bringing people together to talk about how we can deliver Live Well centres, spaces and offers, co-designing the features and principles that need to be at their heart, the event will share what we have learnt to date to inform the next stage of Live Well.

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Community-led support and action is at the heart of thriving neighbourhoods, providing hope for people and a clear route to prevention. Throughout the pandemic and the cost-of-living crisis, community organisations across Greater Manchester have been playing an indispensable role and demonstrated their unique potential to support communities facing hard times through integrated, person-centred and trusted support.

From peer-to-peer groups and informal community networks, to community connectors and social prescribers, communities are central to growing health and wellbeing locally. They are at the forefront of transforming local assets into welcoming community spaces, delivering caring and strengths-based activities and employment training, and ensuring nobody is written off as ‘hard to reach’ by addressing structural inequalities head-on.

We know that growing and sustaining this community-led, everyday support requires an enabling system and a shift towards collaborative, preventative public services that are built on fundamental trust in communities and effective voluntary, community, faith and social enterprise (VCFSE) and statutory sector partnerships. This includes asset-based ways of working and co-production with communities as well as long-term, sustainable funding for local organisations that can enable on-the-ground collaboration instead of competition for resources.

Live Well will work alongside community and system leaders to learn about what it takes to grow everyday community-led support, ensuring it can be accessed by all residents across Greater Manchester. This presents an opportunity for the region to be at the forefront of preventative public services and inclusive economic growth. It provides a chance to develop innovative approaches to employment by investing in people and creating clear pathways for their return to good work that are based on their strengths. Growing great everyday support has the potential to offer effective, trusted, trauma-informed support at people’s doorsteps, able to grow communities’ health and wellbeing and reduce demand on public services.

This event, Growing great everyday support in every neighbourhood to tackle health, social and economic inequalities, is being co-created with communities and public services. Together we will invite people and organisations to celebrate, share, learn and progress:

● Forging connections across the people and places in GM doing this work, and growing the movement

● Sharing stories, practice and learning about great everyday support and communities taking action on the things they care about

● Explore what it takes to broaden residents’ opportunities to be healthy, happy and connected, through a variety of accessible and equitable activities, support and information in their neighbourhood

If you haven’t yet expressed interest in a potential contribution, but would like to, please contact [email protected] and the team will get back to you.

RAMADAN

For those observing Ramadan, there will be a designated prayer room available at lunchtime. It will be available from 12.30pm for the lunch period. If you require a room at any other time, there will be a quiet room available all during the event. The rooms will be advised closer to the time and signposted on the day. For lunch, there will be options to not require a lunch on the dietary needs question on your event booking.

HOW TO GET THERE

The address is: The Monastery Manchester Ltd, Gorton Lane, Manchester, M12 5WF. For public transport links, go to the Bee Network website.

FACILITIES

The venue is accessible with accessible WCs. The venue will have gender neutral WCs

DIETARY AND ACCESSIBILITY REQUIREMENTS

If you have any, please advise when prompted during your event booking, or email to us at [email protected].

Live Well is Greater Manchester’s commitment to ensuring great everyday support is available in every neighbourhood. It will tackle health, social and economic inequalities by changing how we work with communities and in public services to grow opportunities for everyone to Live Well.

Live Well will ensure everyone has the support, control, connections and resources to lead a healthy happy life.

#GMLiveWell

[email protected]

Host or Publisher Greater Manchester Manchester Health & Social Care Partnership