Consortium

for stronger lgbt+ communities

Paul Roberts

Consortium Statement on LGBT Advisory Panel

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Consortium’s Chief Executive sits on the UK Government’s LGBT Advisory Panel as an organisational member, alongside fellow Chief Executive’s at Stonewall and LGBT Foundation. We stand in solidarity with our fellow individual Panel members who have resigned in dismay at the lack of progress on introducing a ban on conversion therapy, amongst other challenging issues. We also stand with other Panel members who have taken the decision to stay in their role and continue the fight, as Consortium will continue to do. We are proud to have worked alongside them all over the last two years, keeping LGBT+ issues on the agenda despite the lack of Ministerial engagement.

Consortium, as the umbrella body for LGBT+ Voluntary and Community organisations across the UK, has a 450 strong membership. We are mandated to fight for the rights of our Member organisations and have a duty to maintain a strategic relationship with the Government of the day. We will stand strong to keep fighting for our LGBT+ communities. We will not shy away from holding this Government to account, whatever direction the Minister chooses to take with the current Advisory Panel, and will not allow them to cause further harm to those we serve. We recognise the privilege this position brings and will continue to work alongside our diverse Members to protect our communities in every way we can.

Census 2021

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The England and Wales Census 2021- taking place on 21st March- will ask voluntary questions about your sexual orientation and trans status for the first time. This is a huge step forwards and has come about in part due to tireless campaigning from LGBT organisations and individuals. The inclusion of these questions represents a rare and valuable opportunity to ensure that LGBT communities are counted, which could have a significant impact on future support and recognition from Government and public bodies and services.

As this year’s Census fast approaches, we are calling on LGBT people across England and Wales to answer these important questions.

Currently, there are no robust figures on the number of LGBT people in England and Wales, and existing estimates vary greatly depending on the source. There is also a lack of data on inequalities faced by LGBT people in our nations. As a result, LGBT people’s experiences, and the inequalities affecting our communities, are often not truly recognised by Government and public bodies and services – and LGBT people are missing out as a result. A lack of data makes it harder to recognise and respond to the needs of LGBT communities, and makes it easier to downplay persistent LGBT inequalities.

The data collected through the Census will play an important role in addressing this gap. It will be of particular use to the LGBT sector as we demonstrate the need for national and local Government to increase investment into LGBT-specific support. In the past, Census data on age, ethnicity and a range of other characteristics has been key to evidencing a need for action, and we believe the same is true when it comes to tackling barriers faced by LGBT people.

We are aware that there are valid concerns around privacy and how your personal data is going to be used. We agree that privacy and data protection is of paramount importance and we can reassure our communities that your data will be kept safe and will not be misused. We will work closely with the ONS to ensure they make it clear how this personal data will be protected.

There are robust measures in place to ensure Census data is protected. It is a crime to share personal census information unless required or permitted by law. Laws in place that cover protection of your data include the Data Protection Act 2018, General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), Census Act 1920 and Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007. Personal data collected is owned by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and personal Census data is not shared with any other Government departments, local councils or marketing agencies. Census data is kept confidential and no individual or their responses can be identified in the statistics that are published. Answers on the online questionnaire are protected during entry and passed into ONS systems through a secure transfer mechanism.  Within ONS systems the information is stored within a highly protected area with limited access and sophisticated monitoring to detect suspicious activity.

By answering the sexual orientation and trans status questions, collectively as a community we can play a vital role in ensuring the potential of the Census to improve the lives of LGBT people – and the services provided to us.

Signed by:

Paul Roberts OBE, CEO Consortium

Nancy Kelly, CEO Stonewall

Paul Martin OBE, CEO LGBT Foundation

Harvey  A. Kennedy-Pitt, CEO Black Beetle Health

Max and Maya Price, Founders, Proud2Be CIC

Carl Austin-Behan OBE LGBTQ+ Advisor to the Mayor of Greater Manchester

Jacob Bayliss, CEO, Switchboard

Jenny-Anne Bishop OBE, Chairperson and Outreach co-ordinator, The Unique Transgender Network and TransForum Manchester

Lucie Brooke Director, Free2B Alliance

Patricia Chair of TransPALS

Lee Clatworthy Acting Chair Sparkle – The National Transgender Charity

Osman – Community Outreach Officer – Hidayah LGBT

Deshields Executive Director Black Trans Alliance

Martha Dunkley co-founder TransLondon

Dr Elly Barnes MBE, CEO Educate & Celebrate

Jane Fae, Chair, Trans Media Watch

Felix Fenlon Chair TPSGHull

Rory Finn, co-founder of Trans Can Sport

Pip Gardner, Chief Executive, The Kite Trust

Lisa Green Beauti.fill Training CEO

Mark Healey CEO 17-24-30 National Hate Crime Awareness Week

Ian Howley, Chief Executive – LGBT HERO

Andy Hunt, Chief Executive Intercom Trust

Helen Jones CEO MindOut LGBTQ Mental Health Service

Anna Kear CEO, Tonic Housing Association

Steph Keeble Director Birmingham LGBT

Salim Khalifa Director, Trade Sexual Health

Shaan Knan, Consortium, Trans Organisations Network

Lukasz   Konieczka, Executive Director, Mosaic LGBT+ Young Persons’ Trust

Amelia  Lee, Strategic Director, The Proud Trust

Kirsty Lewis, Director, Trans-Staffordshire

Nick Lewis, Director, Umbrella Cymru

Community Manager Trans Pride Brighton

Adam McCann, Chief Executive, Diversity Role Models

Cameron Millington, Co-Chair, FTM London

Monty Moncrieff, Chief Executive, London Friend

Leni Morris, CEO, Galop

Heather Paterson, Chief Executive Officer, SAYiT

Lesley Pattenson Pink Sou’westers

Bernard Reed, Trustee, Gender Identity Research and Education Society

Alec Scott Rook, Founder/Chair of TMSA-UK

Karen Skipper CEO Spectra

Lady Stephanie Holmes; CEO; Chrysalis Transsexual Support Groups

Jay Stewart, CEO, Gendered Intelligence

CEO Tags Swimming

Jack Tielemans, trans resource coordinator, The Proud Trust & National Trans Youth Network

Lewis Turner, Chief Executive Lancashire LGBT

Katie Vincent, CEO at Allsorts Youth Project

Alice Wallace, Director, Opening Doors

Garry Wilkinson

Tyron Woolfe, Chairperson Deaf Rainbow UK

 

 

Consortium Welcomes…

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Consortium is delighted to welcome three new members of the team, who all start today (Monday 1st February).

Intersections Fund Development

Consortium is partnering with a range of our Members to explore the future of intersectional focused funding. We are passionate about bringing new income sources to those organisations working with a cross-cutting range of issues and needs including disabled people, those working on racial inequity, older people and trans & non-binary people. Thanks to the National Emergencies Trust and the National Lottery Community Fund we have already engaged a diverse range of organisations in our thinking to date and two people from within our partner organisations will be working with Consortium to further develop our thinking and plans for this exciting area of work.

Rob Berkeley

(He/Him) Award-winning busybody, and recovering academic Dr Rob Berkeley is a founding editor of BLKOUTUK.com, the community-led media/data asset, development agency, and collaborative leadership network for and by black queer men.

He was Director of the racial justice think-tank Runnymede Trust 2009-14.

 

Tyron Woolfe

(He/Him) Tyron has over 25years’ experience in working and volunteering in the Voluntary sector. He is currently Chair of the Deaf Rainbow UK charity, which was set up in 2018.

He is a volunteer with SHOUT, a national crisis text service. Tyron is Deaf and uses British Sign Language.

 

LGBT+ London Engagement

Around a third of Consortium’s Members are based in London. Whilst we firmly remain a UK umbrella body, we respond to the collective needs of our London-based Members with a specific programme of work. Thanks to funding from City Bridge Trust, we are enhancing our London Engagement work to explore what future opportunities exists through relationships with Local Authorities, and to also ensure those based in the outer boroughs of London are better served. All learning from this work feeds into our national team and is used to amplify our entire Engagement Team workplans.

Marita Haakonsen

(She/Her) Coming to us with volunteer experience from both within the LGBT+ sector and the broader voluntary sector, Marita is passionate about community support.

She is looking forward to working with our Members across London to ensure all LGBT+ have opportunities to engage with co-produced and collaborative work.

New Year Blog from our Chair

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It may well be that you are glad to see the back of 2020 in the hope of a more settled, secure and satisfying 2021. And you would of course not be wrong in taking that view.

From my own point of view, and this is not in any way to put a dampener on a more positive outlook, there is still a lot of work to be done, if not more.

However, before totally writing off 2020 as the global ‘Annus Horribilis’ that it was for so many, I’m taking the first few days of the new year to reflect on the real and uninhibited acts of community that I witnessed and was also personally in receipt of. Imagine, for a moment, how it would have been had these acts of individual and group kindness not been in such abundance; in the early days, the notes through my letterbox from strangers offering support, shopping and socialising (over the phone of course), the claps, cheers and celebrating that reverberated around my communal courtyard and across the country on a Thursday evening, the volunteer community organisations that stepped up in a hugely increased capacity to provide their respective communities with ongoing help, health and hearing.

Not because of the pandemic but in spite of it, myself and a few friends, joined later by friends of friends and then people not previously known to us, came together and created a LGBT+ forum for the London borough of Lambeth called Lambeth Links. There is much good that already happens for our community here in Lambeth and our goal is to harness that and be the central point of information and advocacy for the LGBT+ community of Lambeth, the largest in the UK.

It was during the early days of Lambeth Links I first became aware of Consortium and the truly amazing support and guidance that they provide. This, coupled with the accessibility to an engaging, encouraging and effective team provided Lambeth Links with the initial boost that was needed to get us further off the ground. This has culminated with an application to be submitted this month to the Charity Commission, to become a fully fledged registered charity.

So impressed was I with the people at Consortium and so connected did I feel to the importance of what they do, I was driven to apply to become a trustee when the opportunity arose and delighted and excited to be informed that I had been successful in August 2020. Double that feeling when being appointed chair in November 2020 at our AGM, all under the constrictions of COVID-19.

It will not be easy to forget about 2020 and I’ve been taken recently to thinking how I would talk about our present in the future to those whom are not around for or won’t remember this period: ‘I remember when the first national lockdown came into force…’, ‘Mass vaccination rollout started in December 2020…’. Quite apocalyptic when you say it out loud.

Dramatic? Perhaps, but there is a point. How will our community feel in the future? What services will exist for us? What support will there be? Another that will be requiring a vaccine is the economy. This is no doubt going to lead to shortage of resources for members like ours and lead to more competition for that reduced pool and there will be the (ongoing) reduction of central services for what is deemed as non-essential (or not important enough). As is often the case, this will see our community affected disproportionately. Then there is the position of where we will find our priorities on central agendas; those of health inequalities, mental and physical, where we already know that marginalised groups are at greater risk of developing mental health problems; the rights of our trans family as we see more and more attacks upon them for simply being who they are and the subterfuge and clandestine ways with which these attacks are being perpetuated. The threat to our fantastic volunteer organisations, including many members of Consortium, as funding opportunities for become fewer for greater needs.

And this is why, to me, solidarity is of the utmost importance in the years to come. One thing that the creation of Lambeth Links has shown to me is that there is truth to the words of Margaret Mead:  “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”  We need to come together to prepare to fight for what we know is right. If we can do this in a coordinated and organised way, understanding what it is each of us specialise in, accepting that we know our own communities better than others, recognising that most of us are volunteers and applying that knowledge in a patient and understanding way, we can be and create something truly remarkable between ourselves.

Consortium is on hand to help facilitate this. We are here to encourage, enable and enhance our current members, those who are yet to join us and those that reflect our aims, vision and values. So again, before writing off 2020 completely, let’s reflect on the real and uninhibited acts of community that occurred and carry them forward.

So, what does 2021 mean for me? In a word, advocacy. Advocacy for individuals, for groups, for you and for myself too. That is not something we should shy away from, because ‘If you can’t love yourself…!’.

Feel free to reach out to me to discuss this, or anything else, further.

Wising you all a very Happy, Safe and Healthy New Year.

Chris

Emerging Futures Interim Report

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As part of the National Lottery Community Fund’s Emerging Futures programme, Consortium and Wise Thoughts have partnered together for this important project. Wise Thoughts agreed upon and delivered the stories of 15 BAME, LGBTQI+ (Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic origin Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer identified and Intersex+) diverse people / or Queer, Trans, Intersex Persons of Colour (QTIPOCs) based across the UK, dealing with or emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic. The stories “Emerging with Pride” were published on the GFEST 2020 website (and are still live) between Mon 9th to Sat 21st Nov 2020.

The stories, along with an additional 18 mins compilation of all 15 voices (a summary film), and recordings of 15 live webinar sessions can all be found here.

This interim project report highlights some of the intial findings and touches on next steps for the project. Please download and read the report here.

🗓 Attend our upcoming event: Emerging with Pride – ‘Planning our Future’

£290,000 of Grants Awarded to 43 LGBT+ Organisations

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  • Consortium has today announced an investment of £290,000 to 43 LGBT+ organisations across the UK thanks to funds from the National Emergencies Trust
  • A strong diversity of intersecting LGBT+ organisations receive funding to help them respond to the impact of Covid-19 and the increase in demand for LGBT+ services
  • This is in addition to emergency grants totalling £200,000 to 8 LGBT+ Helplines across the UK

 

Consortium, the UKs umbrella body for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender + organisations has announced the successful recipients from its latest grants programme, the LGBT+ Futures: National Emergencies Trust Fund.

43 LGBT+ organisations across the UK will share the funding, with grants ranging from £2,000 to £13,510. Recipients will undertake a diverse range of work, from Black-led LGBT+ health support and provision to support for physical activity across trans communities.

All organisations funded will work to address the increased demands placed upon their services as a result of the Covid-19 global pandemic, which has seen 40% of LGBT+ organisations reporting immediate losses in funds, a majority of LGBT+ organisations seeing increases in demand, 42% of LGBT+ people surveyed seeking support for mental health issues, 70% of LGBT+ surveyed reporting decreased mental wellbeing overall and all data pointing to additional increase for those LGBT+ people who are from communities experiencing racism, are Deaf/disabled or are trans/non-binary.

Funding for the programme is thanks to money from the National Emergencies Trust’s Coronavirus Appeal Funds, who are investing in the LGBT+ sector in recognition of how under-represented the sector has been in Covid-19 related funding to date.

Mhairi Sharp, CEO of the National Emergencies Trust, said: “This year has been incredibly difficult for many people, and the LGBT+ community has been heavily impacted. LGBT+ Consortium is doing incredible work to respond, at speed, to the huge surge in need created by the pandemic. We’re delighted to be able to further their efforts with funding from the Coronavirus Appeal, to ensure that as many people as possible from the community receive the vital support they need.”

Tyron Woolfe, Chair of Deaf Rainbow UK, said: “Deaf Rainbow UK is delighted to receive this funding which will combat the further isolation faced by deaf people during COVID-19 times via Online social meets with their access needs met. A new video for deaf people questioning their gender identity will be valuable support in the absence of any accessible resources.”

Leila Zadeh, Executive Director UK Lesbian and Gay Immigration Group, said: “Covid-19 has resulted in a threefold increase in people contacting us for emotional support. This grant will enable us to continue supporting them during this difficult time as we deliver our services remotely. We will also be able to ensure better data security and avoid security breaches which could put our service users at serious risk.”

Harvey Kennedy, CEO and Founding Director of Black Beetle Health, said: “With optimism ever at the forefront of our minds, QTIPOC communities across the country and around the world have continued to emerge in a spirit of creativity, self-love and resilience. Casting aside hate and oppression and rising above, we continue to demonstrate the uncrushable force of togetherness alongside an uncontainable ambition to continue to succeed–no matter what. For seeing us, for supporting us, for being there when we needed you, for enabling us to do more…Thank you.”

Additional awards totalling £60,000 will be made shortly to LGBT+ organisations in Northern Ireland and Wales. Consortium have been working with LGBT+ organisations in these areas to better understand local needs and where funds can make the most difference.

For the full list of successful organisations to date please visit here.

Paul Roberts OBE, Chief Executive at Consortium said: “The global pandemic has had seriously profound effects on both LGBT+ individuals in need of support, and those organisations who provide lifeline services. I am delighted National Emergencies Trust has entrusted Consortium with these funds so we can get them to where they are desperately needed. We know this is just a drop in the ocean in terms of LGBT+ sector need but these funds are already being put to good use to help organisations build their resilience and to be able to continue offering their services. A huge thank you to all grant recipients for their fantastic work.”