The Scotlands and Bushbury Hill Big Local area was two miles north-east of Wolverhampton city centre, where over 8,000 residents (ONS, 2022a) lived across two housing estates. Historically, the Scotlands and Bushbury Hill estates were felt to have been two close-knit communities with little mixing between them. Although the area included shops, schools, community centres, libraries, religious buildings and GP surgeries, these were not evenly distributed across the area nor accessible to all residents.
The area was in the top 10 most deprived in England, with children particularly affected (MHCLG, 2019a; 2019b). Compared to other Wolverhampton neighbourhoods, there were lower levels of employment (ONS, 2022b) and a higher proportion of residents claiming out-of-work benefits support (DWP, 2024a; 2024b). Residents were experiencing challenges with mental and physical health (MHCLG 2019c) and some parts of the area had a reputation for crime (Police UK, 2024). However, the area had many established and active community organisations and groups, which delivered activities and gave residents a sense of local pride.
Residents felt that in the past, outside investment in the Scotlands and Bushbury Hill Big Local area hadn’t been led by the community and the benefits hadn’t lasted. The partnership wanted Big Local to be different, by building the confidence and capacity of residents to help each other and themselves, developing community-based services and activity, and supporting residents to be active and involved citizens. Through resident consultation, they settled on three priorities: to support families to prosper; to create a safe environment and opportunities for children, young people and older residents; and to enable residents to improve their health and wellbeing.
To ensure residents supported each other and to sustain Big Local activities, the partnership mobilised hundreds of volunteers over the years through different projects, developing more connected, civically active and resilient residents. The partnership also helped other groups protect spaces, including overseeing an asset transfer of a community centre to create a training and social enterprise incubation hub.
The partnership brought in extra capacity and local knowledge to deliver their Big Local plan and meaningfully engage with the communities in the two estates. They partnered with Community Action and Training Services (CAATS) and their Locally Trusted Organisation (LTO), the resident-led Bushbury Hill Estate Management Board. Big Local funding was used to recruit experienced ‘capacity’ workers for CAATS. These local workers trained volunteers, supported residents to develop projects, strengthened the skills and confidence of partnership members, and built the capacity of community groups in the area. They helped establish key projects, and to bring over £3 million in funding and in-kind resources into the area.
Throughout the Big Local programme, the Scotlands and Bushbury Hill partnership worked collaboratively with individuals, organisations and agencies to deliver their plan. Councillors and individuals from community organisations were partnership members, and early on, the partnership created a consortium of community organisations who collectively attracted funding, resources and services across the wider WV10 postcode area. The partnership saw the consortium as part of their legacy.
The partnership recognised the importance of community spaces in the area and established a new organisation, Big Local Venture Ltd, to save a local community centre and manage it through a long-term lease from the council. The space became central to the delivery of their plans. Partnership members who volunteered at the hub were known as the “pink ladies” due to their bright pink polo shirts. They won the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service in 2021, and the centre’s chair received an MBE the following year.
A Big Local partnership was a group made up of at least eight people that guided the overall direction of delivery in a Big Local area.
A locally trusted organisation (LTO) was the organisation chosen by people in a Big Local area or the partnership to administer and account for funding, and/or deliver activities or services on behalf of a partnership. Areas might have worked with more than one locally trusted organisation depending on the plan and the skills and resources required.
A Big Local Plan set out what changes the partnership planned to make, how they planned to deliver on this and how funds were to be allocated. It was written for themselves, their community and Local Trust, as a guide and action plan.
In 2014, Wolverhampton City Council planned to close the community centre and adventure playground on the Scotlands estate. Working with Community Action and Training Services (CAATS) and local partners, the Scotlands and Bushbury Hill Big Local partnership created a business plan which outlined how the centre could be transformed into a self-sustaining social enterprise, hosting services needed by residents. They established Big Local Venture Limited, a community benefit society, to manage the centre, and secured an asset transfer and a 25-year lease from the council.
After three years of hard work, the refurbished Big Local Venture hub opened as a volunteer-led community centre, with a new community café, spaces for hire, a redecorated kitchen and outside space. Within a few years, it was generating enough income to sustain itself and attracting hundreds of residents a week, who accessed services including Citizens Advice, employment support, benefits advice, training, and activities and support for young people and families. It brought residents from the two estates together and became a thriving hub of community-based activity.
To help local community groups and small organisations bid for larger funding contracts, a consortium was formed. The partnership, LTO and CAATS brought together eight community-led organisations and centres, including Big Venture Centre, Wolverhampton City Council and local agencies. They bid for resources as a collective and delivered activities, services and support within the Big Local area and wider WV10 postcode area.
In 2018 the consortium secured £367,000 funding from the Big Lottery Fund to deliver HeadStart, a mental health support programme. Over three years, they ran mental health awareness sessions and counselling for hundreds of children and young people, families, parents and carers.
By the end of Big Local, over a hundred volunteers were involved in the activities, support and services delivered through the community spaces, and the groups that made up the WV10 consortium. Big Venture Centre and Scotlands and Bushbury Hill Big Local partnership emerged as the key partners in the group, and collectively the consortium managed four community hubs, two community shops, two charity shops, a baby bank and a food bank.
To support healthy eating and residents who were struggling financially, Scotlands and Bushbury Hill Big Local partnership supported improved access to affordable healthy food. Projects included running lunch clubs, food banks, and family cookery lessons, growing fruit and vegetables in community gardens, organising meals for children during holidays, and publishing a popular cookbook to help feed a family healthily and on a budget.
Following the success of the community café, which opened in 2017, the partnership responded to the cost of living crisis by turning this into Wolverhampton’s first community shop. Membership was £5 per year which allowed residents to buy food and toiletries at reduced prices. Within a few years, the shop had nearly 1,000 members. The partnership also opened a charity shop to sell affordable clothes and homeware. All three projects generated enough income to be self-sustaining and the community shop model was later replicated across Wolverhampton.
Scotlands and Bushbury Hill partnership saw the value of volunteering and wanted residents to take an active role in supporting each other and running Big Local activities locally. Big Local funding was used to support projects, and paid staff supported voluntary groups and community organisations to train and manage volunteers. This increased the number of volunteering opportunities in the area and built a network of hundreds of volunteers across the estates.
One of the most successful resident ideas was Bushbury Buddies, a befriending service. Volunteers visited lonely and isolated older residents for a chat, helped with small domestic tasks and connected them with social groups in the area.
Big Local funding supported the initial set-up, and the partnership’s capacity workers supported the volunteers. The project successfully attracted an additional £92,000 from the National Lottery Community Fund. With this, the volunteers recruited a paid staff role, trained more volunteers and bought a minibus. Volunteers extended support to the wider WV10 postcode, and to all age groups so they could help additional isolated residents such as lone parents. By 2020, over 25 volunteers were part of the scheme and had supported over 130 people to gain confidence to socialise and participate in activities.
Each Big Local area received approximately £1.2 million (ranging from £1.199 mil to 1.209 mil) to spend over 10–15 years, depending on how much additional funding they accessed from Local Trust to address specific needs. For example, to bring people together at the start of the programme or to access training and support. This has been categorised for areas and at the programme level based on reports received from areas.
Partnerships chose their own priorities and categories for reporting, and were encouraged to use broad categories so they could use the funding flexibly. All areas spent a significant amount of money on ‘Big Local delivery costs’ such as workers’ salaries, stationery and IT equipment. You can find out more about programme level spend in this article. This is how Scotlands and Bushbury Hill Big Local told Local Trust they used their Big Local funding.
Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) (2024a) ‘People on universal credit: not in employment’. (Accessed 23 January 2025)
Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) (2024b) ‘Jobseeker’s allowance’. (Accessed 23 January 2025)
Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG) (2019a) ‘English indices of deprivation 2019’. (Accessed 23 January 2025)
Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) (2019b) ‘English Indices of Multiple Deprivation 2019 – Income Deprivation Affecting Children Index (IDACI)’. (Accessed 23 January 2025)
Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG) (2019c) ‘English indices of deprivation 2019: Health deprivation and disability domain’. (Accessed 23 January 2025)
Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2022a) ‘UK Census 2021: All persons’. (Accessed 23 January 2025)
Office for National Statistics (ONS) (2022b) ‘UK Census 2021: Economic activity status, England and Wales’. (Accessed 23 January 2025)
Police UK (2024) ‘Crime type: All crimes (12 month total)’. Available at: data.police.uk/data/ (Accessed 23 January 2025)
