Care Together e-news June 2024

E-newsletter

27 June 2024

If you missed receiving our June Care Together e-newsletter, don’t despair. You can catch up on all of our news below. Sign up at the bottom of the page to receive our next e-news.

From our Program Director

The Care Together Program continues to grow, with seven of the 12 Care Together projects now underway. The deeper we get into the program, the more interest we’re receiving from people who are starting to discover more about co-ops and want to talk about potential opportunities.

We recently made a submission to the NDIS Provider and Worker Registration Taskforce advocating for recognition of co-operatives in the new registration framework and providing examples of how co-operatives and mutuals support better outcomes for NDIS participants, workers and the public.

For those attending the upcoming Governance in Aged Care: Governing Through Change Conference in Sydney on 24 and 25 July, BCCM and Care Together’s Melina Morrison will be giving a keynote on co-operatives and mutuals as a way of managing services, exploring the potential for the co-op model to innovate and reform the way aged care is governed and operated, and using this unique model to hold providers accountable for outcomes so older people are cared for with dignity and respect.

This issue, we are excited to share a wrap-up of our May Community of Practice (CoP) and care news from Australia and around the world.

Gillian McFee
Program Director, Care Together

May CoP: Introducing Mutual Value Measurement© (MVM) and how it is being used with Care Together projects

Melina Morrison, BCCM CEO, recently led the BCCM’s co-operative housing study tour to Europe. In the CoP she reminded us of how co-operative housing sits alongside co-operative care models, providing further agency to people who receive care.

Care Together Program Manager Michael Pilbrow shared that during his recent trip to represent BCCM at the Asia Pacific Ministerial Conference on Co-operatives in Jordan, international co-operative representatives expressed considerable interest in Care Together.

Peter Hunt, Project Delivery Team Lead, Care Together, provided an overview of MVM and how it is being used in Care Together projects. The MVM Framework measures the value created by co-ops and mutuals by providing a common set of dimensions and shared language for these organisations to articulate their purpose, strategy and the mutual value they generate.

Annabelle Williams, Rural Health Access Manager at Hunter New England Central Coast Primary Health Network, spoke about their experience with using MVM to map out their innovative approach to health care in regional Australia.

If you missed the May Community of Practice meeting, you can watch it on-demand on our website.

Be sure to save the date for our August Community of Practice meeting on Thursday, 29 August 2024, 3–5 pm AEST.

If you missed our past CoP webinars, you can watch them online.

Care Together visits Moruya NSW

Care Together’s Peter Hunt, Clive Thompson and Nick Hislop, and Australian Services Union’s Pat Bates, recently visited Moruya NSW to continue onboarding this new Care Together project. The workshop reviewed the Care Together co-operative development process, scoped the project and introduced the MVM Framework and how it will assist in measuring mutual value.

Representing Australian co-ops in Fiji

Nick Hislop, BCCM Advisor and Care Together Program Manager, represented the BCCM and Australian co-ops and mutuals in Fiji in June at the “UNDESA Capacity Building Workshop: Empowering Cooperatives for Inclusive Economic Growth and Sustainable Development in the Pacific”. His visit was featured in The Fiji Times.

International Day of Cooperatives

On Saturday, 6 July 2024, co-operatives all around the world will celebrate International Day of Cooperatives (#CoopsDay). This year’s theme is “Cooperatives Build a Better Future for All”. The celebration will mark the 30th International Day of Cooperatives recognised by the United Nations and the 102nd International Cooperative Day.

Cooperatives Build a Better World will be the theme for the 2025 UN International Year of Cooperatives (IYC2025), showcasing the enduring global impact cooperatives have everywhere. This theme puts a spotlight on how the co-operative model is an essential solution to overcome many global challenges and continues to play an important role in accelerating efforts to implement the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.

International Labour Conference

The International Labour Organization‘s International Labour Conference (ILC) discussed decent work in the care economy, with CICOPA secretary general, Diana Dovgan, talking about the role of co-ops within the care sector. Read more in her statement.

The ILC’s Conclusions concerning decent work and the care economy have six mentions of the social and solidarity economy (SSE), three mentions of cooperatives and one mention of community-led initiatives.

Care model innovation in the UK

There is much to be learnt from the international experience of care model innovation. This month we take a look at Be Caring and Shaw Healthcare, two UK-based organisations that demonstrate commitment to employee ownership and engagement, which is reflected in their business models and the quality of care they provide.

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