Voluntary Sector Sustainability

What do we mean by Voluntary Sector Sustainability?

The Social Economy encompasses organisations existing between the private market and the public sector. It includes social enterprises, voluntary and community sector organisations, foundations, trade unions, religious bodies, housing associations, co-operatives and more. The key features that social economy organisations share are:

Participation in economic activity, whether through trading, employing staff or helping beneficiaries into work.

Clear social objectives which underpin the activities of the organisation.

Social ownership which sees surpluses reinvested in the organisation rather than distributed as dividends to private shareholders.

The Forum works across the region to promote, develop and represent the social economy. We work with the Development Trusts Association, our partners in the Footsey social economy trade fair.

Together with partners the Forum has helped to establish SEYH (Social Enterprise Yorkshire and the Humber) a regional network of support agencies and practitioners with a remit to support social enterprise. SEYH is a member of the Social Enterprise Coalition that works closely with government on policy to support the development of social enterprise.

The Forum's role is to promote the social economy, build links with regional Government and public bodies, highlight market opportunities and lobby for support of the social economy.

The Forum has secured support from Capacitybuilders for an initiative we are calling Footsey Plus. This initiative aims to provide practical opportunities to bring together enterprising third sector organisations and public purchasers, to build mutual understanding and relationships our area.

If you have any queries regarding the social economy, please contact the Regional Forum on 0113 394 2300. Sign up to SEDnet, our email network on the social economy.

Latest News

Commissioning and procurement: great ideas from a buzzing conference
The Forum is coordinating the way forward for a number of ideas on commissioning and procurement from its conference at Goole on 16th June. Eleven participants, from all sectors, volunteered to be pa...

VCS quarterly confidence survey for Yorkshire and the Humber - June
The Regional Forum has published its latest VCS quarterly confidence survey. Respondents are still gloomy about prospects for the sector, although there has been a slight increase in confidence abo...

Government says what it means by Big Society
The Government has today published details of what it means by Big Society (see link, and download the Big Society Programme). This is likely to have far-reaching effects on the voluntary and communit...

Upcoming Events

24/08/2010: Yorkshire & the Humber Support and Development Organisations Summer Gathering
Venue: St George's Centre, Leeds Time: 1.00pm - 4.30pm Yorkshire & the Humber Forum, and the Yorkshire and the Humber Infrastructure Consortium, is pleased to invite you to attend a gathering of r...

14/10/2010: "How Yorkshire works" - Yorkshire & the Humber Forum information session
Venue: Octagon Centre, Hull Time: 1.00pm - 4.00pm * Do you understand how governance structures work at the regional level? * Where does the voluntary and community sector fit in? * What does th...

02/12/2010: Footsey 2010
Venue: Doncaster Racecourse The ninth annual Footsey trade fair is on and is the key fixture for the social economy in Yorkshire and the Humber. Footsey remains the largest Social Enterprise trade...