Case studies

The Lambeth Living Well Collaborative was established in 2010 and is a platform of partners aiming to radically improve the outcomes experienced by people with severe and enduring mental health problems. It involves citizens, mental health service users, peer supporters, commissioners, the voluntary sector, and health and social care staff.

Loomio is a web application used to assist groups with a collaborative decision-making process by allowing the creation of focused topic forums with set deadlines and space for deliberation. The Welsh Assembly first used the application in 2014 as part of the Health and Social Care Committee's inquiry looking into alcohol and substance misuse in Wales.

Over two years this developed into an organisation called the Lochside Neighbourhood Group, made up of third sector organisations, faith groups, and both private and public sector organisations.

Through Local Area Coordination, service users stay strong, safe and connected in communities which are more welcoming, inclusive and supportive. As a result, they can find practical, non-service solutions to problems and generally avoid the use of acute front-line services which are increasingly unaffordable.

GoCA was made up of representatives from local community groups in Govanhill and was held accountable for its spend by the local community. The group was supported by Oxfam's UK Poverty Programme in Scotland, which helped facilitate the participatory budgeting process and bridged the perceived gap between public sector workers and GoCA members.

The strategy was produced with the help of a number of stakeholders, including public bodies, agencies, communities and citizens. Lambeth Citizens, part of Citizens UK, were hired as an integral part of the strategy's production, using their knowledge and expertise of the area to create a strategy which would be most beneficial to residents.

Between 2009 and 2010, a project known as ‘You Decide!' was given £4.76 million by the Tower Hamlet's Council, plus an additional £300,000 by the local Primary Care Trust (PCT), totalling over £5 million over the two years.

Participatory budgeting was created in Porto Alegre, a city of 1.3 million people in Brazil, in 1989.

Involving older people case studies Leeds City Council created a website where older people, their relatives and carers, could find the right information quickly. To support older people's engagement with the website, the team have since set up a network of computer training courses.

Bournemouth Borough Council has taken a once-in-a-generation opportunity to co-ordinate and shape the town centre's development.