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 Telly Talk
Shropshire County Council
has teamed up with Age Concern, Citizens Advice and housing
associations to offer help to residents in rural areas
unable to access services as easily as people in towns
and cities. It provides free, independent and confidential
advice via webcam on a range of subjects, including debt
issues, employment and housing.
Called Telly Talk, it is available at set times each week at
11 community venues across the county. It is accessible to
those with sight or hearing impairments and there is no need
to know how to use a computer. They just touch a button and
an adviser does the rest.
Flavia Cheshire, from Shropshire Broadplaces, said: “By
coordinating our resources, people who live in rural areas
will have better access to a wide range of services on their
doorstep.”
(Picture: residents at Ruyton XI Towns Village hall talking to
a council officer)
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Independent living
Older people in Hull are being helped to live longer, healthier
and happier lives in their own homes through interactive broadband
TV access to ‘telehealth’ and ‘telecare’ services.
‘STREAM Independent Living’, part of a radical
overhaul of Hull City Council’s Community Care services
for the over-65s, is available through Internet Protocol Television
(IPTV). It provides residents with information about local
services, a ‘what’s on’ calendar and communication
tools such as email as well as a facility to book services
from their own homes.
Each person receives a free broadband-enabled set-top box
providing access to free-to-air digital channels and video-rich
public services, entirely on demand. Accommodating more than
100 individual programmes – everything from ‘keep
fit’ armchair exercises to understanding benefits entitlements – the
service also integrates content and information from other
web-based systems.
Steve Fleming, Group Manager Knowledge Economy for Hull City
Council, says: “We are demonstrating how technology can
be used to solve problems for individuals, government and service
providers. The STREAM Independent Living pilot simultaneously
tackles the social exclusion of vulnerable older people, the
productivity targets of service providers and the transformation
agenda for government, on the back of Digital Switchover.”
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 It’s
a family affair
A lone mother of two who is fluent in English, Somali, Dutch
and Swahili has begun working from home as an online interpreter – thanks
to Aston Pride’s ‘Computers in the Home’ initiative,
supported by Digital Birmingham.
Life changed for the better when Warda’s son, Mohamed
Abdullah, was given a computer as part of the ‘Computers
in the Home’ project, designed to both improve children’s
education prospects and to help adults enhance their skills
and employability. Says Warda: “I deal with between ten
and 20 calls a day and work for a variety of organisations – from
local authorities and job centres to immigration offices, the
police and doctors’ surgeries. I also work in the evenings
for companies in the USA and Australia.”
In an area with higher than average unemployment, the project
helps fulfil Aston Pride’s objective of encouraging adults
to improve their qualifications, increase opportunities and
contribute to economic growth. |
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Bringing the world of work right to the doorstep
Nottingham’s Homeshoring project gives people the opportunity
to work from home handling calls for call centres by using
technology – namely broadband and VoIP technology (Voice
over Internet Protocol). The project was delivered in
partnership with Cisco and UK Virtual Call Centres and has
received £60,000 funding through the GNP and Accelerate
Nottingham’s Digital Challenge bid.
Homeshoring offers people the opportunity to work from home
and is suited to people whose lifestyles are more home-based – including
the over 50s, women returning to work, people on incapacity
benefit and those living in rural areas of Nottinghamshire.
It helps to tackle many of the problems experienced
by traditional office-based call centres such as high turnover
of employees, recruitment costs and health problems associated
with high density office environments.
Peter Goodwin of Accelerate Nottingham – a
Strategic Action Team within GNP – said: "Technology
offers a real opportunity to get people back into work. Performance
is just as good as in office-based call centres, in some places,
better. It's not just corporate social responsibility; it has
mainstream business value.”
A successful pilot at Broxtowe’s BEST Centre, has been
completed and is being evaluated. Next steps are a possible
partnership with Bristol City Council to roll out the initiative.
Bristol City leaders have already spent time in Nottingham
looking at the Homeshoring project, speaking to individuals
involved in the initiative and learning about personal experiences. |
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Helping hand for carers
The Norfolk Blurb and Text Pal projects – which put
young carers in touch with other young people for peer support – has
won a major award from the International Centre of Excellence
for Local e-Participation (www.icele.org)
Norfolk Blurb is the county council’s Children’s
Services website, featuring a peer agony aunt, safe chatroom
and social network, articles written by young people on issues
such as self-harm and depression, a ‘positive activities’ search
engine and lots more.
The ‘Text Pal online’ project was a development
of the ‘Text Pal’ mobile phone project, which saw
young volunteers befriending young carers via text messaging.
Now through the ‘Text Pal online’ social network
any young person can safely seek peer support.
The original funding for Text Pal came through the Digital
Challenge competition and the project is being held up as best
practice by the DC10plus network as well as ICELE.
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‘Carbon neutral’ communities
Connecting Bristol is leading DC10plus work on developing
and sharing greener and smarter ways of living and working.
For example, the Knowle West Media Centre in South Bristol
is leading a project which is trying to make homes and lifestyles
in the community ‘carbon neutral’.
Knowle West Carbon Makeover entails ‘community
champions’ working
with ‘digital innovators’ to develop a variety
of ideas, including promoting a local fruit and vegetable market,
filling a pizza oven, selling vegetable seedlings and carrying
out energy audits.
www.connectingbristol.org
www.kwmc.org.uk |
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Knowledge bank
A number of significant pieces of research will help government
make progress on the Digital Inclusion agenda by identifying
best practice and demonstrating how it can be incorporated
into local service delivery.
The work includes:
• Mapping digital inclusion issues against 198 indicators
• Profiling of vulnerable groups – children in care,
people with learning difficulties, those not
in education, employment or
• training and offenders
• Identifying skills needed by local government officers
and others to tackle digital exclusion
• Mapping measures which have been effective in achieving
digital inclusion through support for intermediaries
• and independent living
• Documenting successes and failures of previous efforts
to spread best practice
• Collating information from a number of organisations on a single
site
Anyone wanting to be kept up to date with
progress in this area or with examples they think should be
considered, should email hannah.viall@dc10plus.net |
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 ‘Reaching
the Final Third’
The DC10plus network is playing a major role in co-hosting the
National Digital Inclusion Conference in London on 29 April
2008. Delegates will explore what needs to be done to reach
the ‘final third’ of people unable to participate
in and benefit from the ‘digital revolution’.
Delegates will consider and discuss the costs and benefits of
universal access and explore the role of the not-for-profit,
private and public sectors before agreeing what action needs
to be taken.
Stephen Dodson, Programme Director, DC10plus, who is among the
keynote speakers, says: “There has never been a better
time to bring together policy makers and practitioners to discuss
fully these converging developments.”
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Digi-snippets
Silver Surfers' Day (23rd May) is aimed at teaching older people
how to harness the power of the web, hosted by Digital Unite [www.digitalunite.com/ssd]
Other dates for your diary:
The
Connected Neighbourhoods Forum, a new DC10plus initiative
looking at transforming a community's digital and connectivity
infrastructure to better match the needs of citizens is now
open to membership. For further details, please visit www.connectedneighbourhoods.org.uk or email antony.bernstein@connectedneighbourhoods.org.uk
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And,
finally ...
Are you a digital dinosaur? Digital Curve is an online fun activity,
developed by Digital Birmingham, which helps people assess their
IT use and skills.
Take the test @
www.digitalbirmingham.co.uk/curve.php
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that are
making a real difference to people's lives
through good sense and good practice.
If you want more information
please contact hannah.viall@dc10plus.net
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