January Newsletter 2021

Welcome to the Social Value UK January Newsletter.

Despite the troubling times we find ourselves in, we at Social Value UK would like to wish you a Happy New Year, and we hope you, your colleagues, friends and families are all healthy and well. 

Social Value UK will be offering a range of distance learning options, please click the button below for more information:

Big Developments in Social Value

This month we'd like to focus on some of the key things going in the social value sector currently, 2021 is starting off with a lot of changes and big announcements in the social value world! We are seeing multiple sectoral changes and the ripple effects of these. It looks like 2021 is going to be a big year for our movement, now's the time to get on top of all of the new developments and be ready to champion the social value movement!

• This January we have launched our workshops to dive into the Social Value Act and central government’s recently published Policy Procurement Note 06/20 coming into play from 1st of January 2021. We will be offering three workshops tailored to specific sectors, with a strictly small number of attendees to ensure in-depth discussion and learning. These have all sold out, but please reply with any interest if you'd like to hear more. Find out more here.
• In line with this, we have published an SVUK team review of the new Social Value Model for central government procurement (PPN06/20), a deep dive into this new addition to the social value landscape. Read more here.
• Social Value International have opened their consultation on the latest instalment of Principle 2 of the Social Value Principles: Understand What Changes! Open until January 26th, find out more here.
• Social Value UK will be submitting a response to the Green Book Review and we invite all of our members to discuss the consultation and share thoughts. More information on the consultation and a previous webinar here.
• Published just before Christmas was the BSI's 'First guide to understanding and enhancing social value'. Catch up on this big development here and read a short SVUK response here.

Other updates:

• We're proud of SVI partnering with Efiko Academy and offering all SVI members (thus all SVUK members!) a discount! sign up with discount code. Use the discount code “socialvaluefriend” and join the Efiko community: don’t hesitate and start boosting your impact skills today!
• As part of the EGGS project, SVUK are looking for people to help beta test an educational video game for students aged 11-15. This involves playing the game and providing feedback via an online survey. More information and a link to download the game are available in this document.
• Save the date for Social Value Matters 2021, taking place both online and in person in Bangkok, Thailand with Social Value Thailand on 20th and 21st October 2021! Find out more here.

• We are now delivering our most popular training course online; Social Value and SROI Accredited Practitioner Training. If you're interested in taking part, find dates, pricing and more here. Next course kicks off February 2nd!

• We have a few great events scheduled, including 'Mitigating Impact of Covid', hosted by Social Value Engine, Rural Community Network, East Riding of Yorkshire Council, Nuffield Trust, Rose Regeneration, Cornwall Rural Community Charity, Social Value UK on January 26th! As well as WhatImpact's Enabling impact creation in the social value market Webinar on January 21st. Learn more about our upcoming events and sign up here.

Assurance and Accreditation News

• Our next Report Assurance round opens on January 18th! Get ready and find out more updates on the 2021 assurance calendar here.
• From February 8th, you can apply for Level 2 Accredited Practitioner and Level 3 Advanced Practitioner status! Find out more.

Inspiring Impact Updates

The below graphics showcase our Q1 2021 Inspiring Impact events:

South East

Session 2: How to gather data - Qualitative or Quantitative? - An Introduction to methods - Thursday 18th February

Session 3: Working practices and impact culture - organisational and sectoral on Thursday 18th March

North West 

Session 3: Working practices and impact culture - organisational and sectoral on Wednesday 27th January.

Midlands

Session 3: Working practices and impact culture - organisational and sectoral on Wednesday 20th January.

Find out more here.

Key Updates and Reading

• The Joseph Rowntree Foundation have published their 2020/21 edition of their annual report on the nature and scale of poverty across the UK, and how it affects people struggling to stay afloat. Read their findings here.
• The Wellbeing of Future Generations Bill is scheduled to have its second reading in the Commons on January 29. Read about some key updates and the involvement of The Big Issue here.
• The Prince of Wales has today launched a 10-point pandemic recovery charter that challenges businesses to "put nature, people and the planet at the heart of global value creation" over the next decade. Read more here.
• S3 Solutions newsletters and social media accounts have been posting lots of great funding opportunities, find out more here.

Positive News Updates

To close our final newsletter of the year, we'd like to end on a few pieces of uplifting news articles: good news, good reads and some good distraction. 

The UK will spend at least £3bn of international climate finance on nature and biodiversity over five years - BBC News

The UK will soon have a dedicated register of tradeswomen - The national database will ensure that vulnerable householders who feel safer with tradeswomen are able to find them - Positive News

'...the BBC, which plans to air several hours of educational programming throughout the lockdown for both primary and secondary school students on various channels. - RadioTimes

And a piece to fill you with nostalgia and take your mind off the state of the world:

Modern life is rubbish! The people whose homes are portals to the past - The Guardian

Stay safe and well,

Social Value UK

Would you like to host a webinar or Ideas Exchange session? Then get in touch with Rebecca Harvey. 

If you have any feedback or would like to make a contribution to a future newsletter, please email David. 

The Social Value UK office is currently closed whilst our staff work from home, if you need to reach any of us, please contact the member of staff you wish to speak to directly via e-mail, if you do not know who you need to speak to or wish to make a general enquiry, please e-mail info@socialvalueuk.org and we will get back to you as soon as we can.

Social Value UK encourages you to take care of yourself physically and mentally during this difficult time.