Volunteering is about people spending their own time to do something unpaid that aims to benefit the environment, individuals or groups of people.  Its about helping people who aren’t close relatives.

Increasing volunteering in Staffordshire means a better place for us all.  Not only does it help people to learn new skills and experiences, meet new people, gain confidence and essentially benefit others, it also helps to bring communities close together and improve the economy.

There are a number of different organisations across Staffordshire that work towards increasing the volunteering numbers and ensure a quality experience for those volunteers.  In October 2010, the ‘Staffordshire Volunteering Visioning Event’ brought together representatives from across these organisations, and one thing was agreed, we all need to work on a co-ordinated approach.

A working group, which included representatives from across these organisations, has now developed a draft framework, suggesting definitions, aims and actions of how volunteering in Staffordshire can grow over the next five years.

As someone that understands how valuable volunteering is to both the local community and Staffordshire as a whole, we need your views on this.

We only need a few minutes of your time to tell us what you think about the aims and objectives, and how it aligns with your own/organisation’s objectives, and critically if you think anything is missing.

Telling us your views will take just a few minutes and will help us to ensure that the strategy is a true reflection of what all stakeholders want.

Please follow the below link to access the framework and questionnaire.

http://www.staffordshirepartnership.org.uk/thirdsector/volunteering/

The Department of Health is establishing a new system of patient-led inspections of the hospital environment, as announced by the Prime Minister in January this year.  In order to develop the questions to ask patients and their carers, it is important to find out what’s important and really matters to them about the hospital environment.

Here is an opportunity for you to contribute to this.  You are invited to take part in the survey if:

• You have experience of being treated in hospital in the last couple of years, and or
• you are able to represent a patient or group of patients.

The survey can be found here:

http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22FNNCWBVHL

Please do take a few minutes to complete the questionnaire, ideally by Friday 1st June, your feedback really matters.  All responses will be treated confidentially.