In 2010, Action Hampshire administered the Hampshire & IoW portion of the South East Community Empowerment Awards, which was an initiative of the former South East Regional Empowerment Partnership.
After difficult review, four organisations won the top prize of £5,000. One of these was Buriton Village Voice Group.
At the time the judges said:
The Buriton Village Voice Group is a team of volunteers who have produced a very successful parish plan for the rural parish of Buriton. They started from the maxim that ‘life is never perfect’ and there are some things that people would like to improve or change, and other things that they would like to stay just as they are.
The project is a summary of all the main issues (social, environmental and economic) that concern people in the parish, and how they’d like things to be in the future. The Village Voice Group spent over a year using all kinds of creative techniques to make sure that their consultative work and ‘problem identification’ reaching all parts of the community – not just the usual suspects or a vocal minority.
Armed with solid evidence, they then developed a series of action plans to address all the important issues.
Virtually all the action plans have led to valuable changes on the ground and improvements in peoples’ lives. The vast majority of these achievements have been undertaken by the people of Buriton acting together ‘with each other, for each other’. Judges felt this project was a model of fantastic community led planning. Excellent community action and influence over decision making. Sustainable, empowering and learning can be shared. Wide range of outcomes.
Having won the award, the group decided to invest their winnings in creating a time capsule book, ensuring that the whole community would benefit from their winnings. They commemorated village life in the landmark Diamond Jubilee and Olympics year of 2012.
Time capsule book by Editing Edge, via this link.
Parish plan available via this link.
