 What's On in October:
 Artist open calls, jobs, commissions, volunteer and funding opportunities across Lancashire.
Over the past six months, we’ve shared more than 100 training opportunities and creative career opportunities across Lancashire. This month’s creative career development round-up highlights a selection of exciting roles, commissions, open calls and professional development opportunities from across the county, with deadlines throughout October. Got a Lancashire-based opportunity in the arts to promote? If applications close within the next couple of months, send the details to [email protected] and we’ll help spread the word Welcome to the Get Grants October 2026 Newsletter! Get Grants FREE Virtual Conference kicks off tomorrow! Join us 6th & 7th October 2026, 10am - 3pm for two days of expert fundraising advice, top tips, Q&As, networking, peer-support, and lots of chat! View the full conference programme and line-up of speakers on our website. Everyone who registers will also receive all the session recordings! We've also have plenty of Training Courses, MASTERCLASSES and FREE Events designed to help you learn, connect and grow. Coming up on 20th October at 12pm - 1 pm, we have our Grant Assessment MASTERCLASS with Get Grants Director, John Ellery. Explore behind-the-scenes of the grant assessment process, sharing what assessors look for when making those all-important funding decisions.   One thing many people don't realise about Neighbourhood Watch is that we are a charity, (charity number 1173349, in fact!) and we're quite a small one too. It’s a team of just twelve people who support a network of brilliant volunteers across the country.
As a volunteer-led organisation, we achieve a huge amount with limited resources. Our fantastic Neighbourhood Watch members make a difference in communities every day. We've just published our latest Impact Report so you can see how we've been creating better and safer neighbourhoods over the last 12 months. As well as our Impact Report, highlights this month include:
 Welcome to your copy of our Autumn / Winter 2026 Carers' magazine. We hope you enjoy reading our magazine!
Today, we are delighted to share our Neighbourhood Watch Network 2025–26 Impact Report. This report celebrates everything we have achieved together over the past year and showcases the incredible difference made by our members, volunteers, Coordinators, Association Leads, partners and supporters across England and Wales. It demonstrates how, together, we are creating safer, stronger and more connected communities through our shared commitment to Watch, Connect and Act.  Voluntary, Community, Faith, and Social Enterprise
The VCFSE Alliance is a group made up of representatives from the VCFSE sector across Lancashire & South Cumbria Its purpose is to strengthen equitable, meaningful, and effective partnership working between the wider VCFSE sector, public sector, and health and care. The Alliance acts as a collective voice, ensuring that the sector’s insight, expertise, and community connections shape priorities across Lancashire and South Cumbria (LSC). Below are the key messages emerging from the LSC VCFSE Alliance. At NAVCA, we have been reviewing our membership criteria to make sure they reflect the critical role local infrastructure organisations (LIOs) play at place and the changing landscape in which we all operate. Thank you to everyone who has shared thoughts over the past few months. As we work with trustees to finalise proposals in October and November, we wanted to update you on where our thinking has got to. Local infrastructure is changing in response to increasingly complex political and social challenges, pressures on funding, and changes in how communities and public services work. Neighbourhood working, changes in local government, devolution and changes to health systems are reshaping the landscape. At the same time, reduced investment risks fragmentation and makes it harder to build the relationships and partnerships that underpin effective infrastructure. Our mission is to advocate for and support good infrastructure everywhere. To do this well, we need a network that reflects the different ways infrastructure support is delivered, while being clear about what makes local infrastructure distinctive. A key recommendation from our National Lottery-funded Development Programme was for NAVCA to have a clear focus on infrastructure support and the unique role of LIOs as convenors, strategic partners and leaders. Members and prospective members have also told us that our membership criteria need to be clearer. Through 1:1 conversations and drop-ins, we have heard strong support for affirming the strategic leadership role of LIOs at place and defining that role more clearly for the future. This includes being more assertive about the role of local infrastructure in connecting and convening between communities, and with statutory partners including local authorities, health systems and strategic authorities.  The October edition of the Rossendale Community Bulletin has been published and is available at: community-bulletin-october-2026   Support today changes lives tomorrow. But too often we’re told to wait, or offered support that isn’t right for who we are and what we need. You can help us get people seen, really seen this World Mental Health Day, by supporting our See Me Now campaign.
We support thousands of fundraisers every year - so what are the most popular fundraising topics?
Check out the fundraising topics that are most in demand, including Corporate, Storytelling, Major Donor Fundraising, and Monitoring & Evaluation. Follow us on Eventbrite to be the first to hear about new Events and Training!  It feels like well and truly the end of summer, with leaves turning on the trees. I came back from holiday this week to a sense of new term, and that is certainly playing through in the policy space.
The Local Government Reorganisation pause will impact some of you significantly. As we find out more, we will keep you updated. Beyond that, I have a sense of anticipation, as we expect more detail on devolution of decision-making, fiscal autonomy and implementation to combined authorities. Over the summer, many of you have made significant steps in how you are working with combined authorities, and that will be an important agenda through the rest of this year. Alongside that, the importance of neighbourhoods and neighbourhood working will also grow – we are looking to influence on the critical role LIOs play in connecting within neighbourhoods, and connecting neighbourhoods with statutory authorities. That plays through in neighbourhood health, governance, Pride in Place and more. Earlier this month, the announcement about Reach Volunteering impacted many of us, but I have been delighted this week that they have secured funding to remain open. It does highlight the precarious nature of infrastructure funding, and we'll continue make the case for a more sustainable future. There won’t be one single answer, but we will keep using research and evidence from members to demonstrate the value and importance of infrastructure. You'll see more on that in our upcoming infographic series, so keep an eye on this newsletter and LinkedIn for that.  Welcome back! We hope you had a fantastic summer break.
Our September Sway is now available and full of updates, news, and upcoming events. Take a few minutes to have a read and see what's been happening across the service.  Get your charity’s story in front of journalists ✍️Applications open on a rolling basis
Got a newsworthy story but struggling with limited PR capacity and budget? Media Trust has partnered with PA Media Group, the UK’s national news agency, to help small charities refine and distribute their press releases. If selected, you’ll receive expert feedback from media professionals to strengthen your story, followed by free distribution through PA Media Group’s press release service giving journalists across the UK the opportunity to discover your story. Whether you’re launching a campaign, sharing new research, announcing a milestone or highlighting your impact, this could help your story reach a much wider audience. Applications are open on a rolling basis, with up to two charities selected each month. We welcome applications from UK charities and nonprofits with an annual income of £1 million or less. Apply with your press release idea today! Apply for our press programme  As we head into autumn, we are reflecting on the changes and challenges ahead, particularly with the closure of Reach Volunteering that was announced earlier this week. Reach provided an essential infrastructure service to the voluntary sector, and we are saddened to see it close. Read more below.
With devolution and local government reorganisation also continuing to impact local voluntary sectors, we want to make sure all types of organisation feel confident to navigate these changes. In this newsletter, you’ll find links to events, resources and information all related to devolution and LGR. As always, if you have any feedback on this newsletter, let us know by replying directly to this email. In the meantime, you can stay in the loop by connecting with us on LinkedIn.  Friday 2 October 2026 | Burnley Football Club | 9:30am - 4pm
With Friday 2 October getting closer, we're busy bringing together a day full of great conversations, new ideas, different perspectives and plenty of opportunities to meet people you might not usually cross paths with. Whether you're coming to learn something new, meet others working across different sectors, share experiences or simply step away from the usual working day and do something a little different, we want there to be something for everyone. And running through it all is this year's theme: connection. Here's a little more of what you can expect from the day... Welcome to the Get Grants September 2026 Newsletter! We’re excited to share our upcoming line-up of Training Courses & Events taking place this month. There’s now just one month to go to Get Grants FREE Virtual Conference, with over 2,500 people already signed up! Join us on October 6th and 7th for two days of expert advice, networking, peer support and inspiration. The full line-up of speakers and funders can now be found on our website, with the full programme coming very soon! We also have Telling Your Charity’s Story MASTERCLASS with Andy King on 10th September, 2pm - 3pm - learn how to make people instantly understand your work, and why they should support you! The Centre for Processional Culture will help protect Britain’s rich but increasingly vulnerable processional traditions. There are few art forms quite like procession.
Part performance, part ritual, part celebration and part public gathering, processions have the unusual ability to bring art and culture out of traditional venues and directly into the places where people live. They can be ancient or entirely contemporary. They might involve music, theatre, dance, puppetry, costume, sculpture, carnival, ceremony or simply the collective act of moving through a place together. And yet, despite the extraordinary variety and cultural significance of processional practice, there has been relatively little dedicated infrastructure in the UK focused specifically on understanding, developing and supporting it. That is beginning to change. What's On in September:
The September 2026 Rossendale Connected Community Bulletin is here! Produced by the Rossendale Connected network, the monthly bulletin brings together useful information from health and community partners, helping residents stay informed about support, services and activities taking place across Rossendale.   It's been a busy few months...
Healthwatch Lancashire have been busy during the summer months with projects, events, and most importantly - talking to you and gathering your experiences! Scroll down for an update on our newest team member, PLACE assessments, reports and projects⭐  There’s plenty to catch up on in this month’s edition, including important updates on cyber security and upcoming changes to regulated activity with children.
You’ll also find new opportunities for your organisation, useful resources and ways to get involved with the wider voluntary sector. Read on to find out more. |
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