BA13 Community Area Partnership focus on children and young people

The most recent BA13+ Community Area Partnership meeting took place on 1st November at the Laverton and focussed on children and young people in the Westbury area.

Phil McMullen reports, “This latest in an increasingly popular series of public meetings, which have in the past year also covered issues as diverse as the environment, the arts, transport, health, community safety and business issues, welcomed as guest speaker on this occasion, Ruth Brooks-Martin, from Spurgeons.

“Ruth began by outlining her background as manager of the children’s centre and latterly her role within the Spurgeons Children’s Charity which supports vulnerable and disadvantaged children and families.

“The Wiltshire Together For Families project started in March 2017. Ruth works for 21 hours a week, supporting existing parent and toddler groups or helping churches and community groups to set up new groups across west Wiltshire. She is supporting the White Horse Ministry team to set up a parent and toddler group on Thursday afternoons at the Parish Hall in Westbury as there are no groups left in the centre or the north of the town, and the housing on the northern side is expanding rapidly.

“Ruth also runs a scheme called Baby Bundles. From her previous work in the children’s centre in Westbury, she is aware that there is nothing in west Wiltshire to support families who are in financial need and who have a young baby or are about to have one. Since launching the scheme in April, she has had 47 referrals, all of whom have been actioned within a three-week time frame. Referrals are universal, through health visitors and midwifes for example.

“Ruth has set up a baby bundles bank in a storage unit in Bromham, with generous supplies of donated clothing and equipment for new parents, although a new (free) storage location is desperately needed as Bromham is inconvenient in many ways. The search is on for a dry, secure unit nearer to Westbury and preferably one with access to tea-making facilities and a loo!

“In summarising, Carole King, the chair of BA13 CAP, warmly thanked Ruth for a very engaging and interesting presentation. There followed the AGM of the partnership, with Carole King once again unanimously elected chair for the coming year. Minutes are available on request.

“The date of the next steering group meeting is Wednesday 12th December  at Crosspoint. The venue and focus of the next partnership meeting, which takes place on 21st February, will be decided by the steering group at that meeting.”