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The Partnership Development Project is a project managed by MENTER, the regional network of Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) organisations and communities for the East of England. It’s main aim is to assist with the integration of asylum seekers, refugees and migrant workers in the East of England and to improve local community cohesion through partnerships working. We look to review the relevance of accumulated knowledge for other transitional groups. We aim to be working with groups working for the benefit of other migrant communities such as Gypsies and Travellers, and issues dealing with race and social cohesion.

The project’s steering group consists of EERA SMP (East of England Regional Assembly Strategic Migration Partnership), the Refugee Council, VSRN-EE (Voluntary Sector Refugee Network East of England), the East of England development Agency (EEDA), Government Office of the East of England (GO-East) and MENTER.

The project is funded by the Department for Communities and Local GovernmentsConnecting Communities Plus grant (The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) was created on 5 May 2006 with a powerful remit to promote community cohesion and equality, as well as responsibility for housing, urban regeneration, planning and local government.)

MENTER Newsletter June 2008, click here

The Partnership Development Project runs until March 2009 and our key areas for development for the period 2006-09 phase are:

To support effective and sustainable multi-agency fora through the establishment of sustainable strategic and regional links and other appropriate methods;
To facilitate access to and the effective exchange of successful practice through website, database of good practice and other means;
To assist in setting up new multi-agency fora as and where needed;
To develop processes for multi-agency fora to identify, prioritise and implement action to address access/ racial harassment/ cohesion issues;
To support refugee and community participation in multi-agency fora through developing resources and other suitable means;
To assess need and potential for appropriate fora to address needs of other transitional groups (e.g. migrant workers, gypsies and travellers);
To develop and implement a model for migrant fora as and where appropriate.

In addition to the Partnership Development Project, MENTER has recently secured funding from the Lloyds TSB Foundation to start a new project named Pathways to Employment Project (link under construction), which also focuses on refugees and other migrants. The Pathway Project aims to support individuals from refugee and migrant worker communities to access jobs in the health and social care sector by providing them with information and support during their journey to employment.