Overview
The Equal Community Initiative under the ESF is meant to provide services to socially excluded groups with the purpose of moving those individuals into training and employment. This means that any service user of ESF Equal funded services must be 1) in a socially-excluded group and 2) looking to move into training and/or employment. Each Equal programme chooses and defines the socially excluded groups it will work with and the services it will offer.
The Equal programme is not intended to provide services to every resident of an area nor is it intended to provide services to every socially excluded resident of an area. An Equal Development Partnership chooses which groups they will concentrate on.
Target Groups
The Equal Brighton & Hove programme was developed to provide services to specific target groups. These groups were chosen by the Management Partnership in Action 1 and were based on research done on the Brighton and Hove area. These are the people who count as beneficiaries and are eligible to receive Equal services.
Equal Brighton & Hove chose as its target groups 11 specific categories. These were identified in the DPA as:
Accessing Services - Direct & Indirect Service Users
Each project has as its focus one or more specific target groups; this should have been clarified through the project bidding process. Each project should be designed to address the needs of the specific target group(s) and directed at recruiting the specific target groups to participate in the project. These named groups of beneficiaries are referred to as direct beneficiaries and are eligible to access the services.
A beneficiary who is not in the project’s specific target group(s) but is in one of Equal Brighton & Hove's other target groups are considered indirect beneficiary and are eligible to participate in that service. It is worth bearing in mind that indirect service users are service users that a project has not been designed to specifically cater for.
If a service is being funded by Equal at 100% then only people who qualify as either direct or indirect beneficiaries are eligible. If a service is only part-funded by Equal, then anyone can attend that course, as long as there are also Equal beneficiaries being served. Non-EBH target groups cannot be counted as service users towards a project's EBH targets. These are not arbitrary rules which can be changed. These are requirements of Equal and the ESF.
With respect to the Annex 1 information, the only service users that should be estimated in that document are the direct beneficiaries. With respect to reporting, all service users, both direct and indirect, should be reported.
EBH Eligibility
To receive services funded by EBH and therefore also for audit purposes, the eligibility of a beneficiary must be evidenced. The criteria for eligibility is determined by the European Union and is codified in regulations and contractually. Equal Brighton & Hove (EBH) has no authority to change or waive these requirements.
There are three requirements:
A project must be able to evidence that a person who has received Equal-funded services has met all three of the eligibility requirements. If a project is unable to do so, then that person is ineligible. The forms provided for projects to use - if filled out correctly - will provide all of the evidence necessary to prove eligibility. Guidance on using the forms can be found on the Forms and Monitoring page.
Evidence for target group membership varies according to what target group membership is claimed. Specific target group information is included on relevant target group pages listed below.
Service Users Accessing More than One (1) ESF Funded Programme/Project
Our guidance from Ecotec states that there is no problem with having a service user taking up more than one ESF funded programme as long as:
Black Minority Ethnic - Overview
The area of BME groups is not without its complexities. We are interested in which category your client self-identifies as. If they themselves indicate that they are in any other category than white British, they are considered to be in the BME category.
A person's country of origin has very little bearing on whether they are eligible for Equal funded support.
This process should be applied to all potential clients. We have specific guidance around the eligibility of potential Romanian and Bulgarian service users: please download this document.
Guidance on BME Eligibility
The following questions establish whether an individual is eligible for Equal funding:
1) Are they resident in this country?
2) Are they legally able to work?
3) Are they 16 years or over?
If they can answer “yes” to all these questions then we move on to look at target groups, if not they are ineligible.
Projects
The following projects target the BME target group:
Further Guidance on Equal Brighton & Hove's Geographical Area
The aim of Equal Brighton & Hove (EBH) is to assist disadvantaged or hard-to-reach target groups in and around the city and increase their employability. Generally, EBH activities are limited to Brighton & Hove. However, we understand that there are instances where service users will reside outside of the city limits. In these instances, where a project can justify the need to serve individuals residing in surrounding areas, it will be acceptable for that project to do so. In particular, if service users are within the travel to work area and looking to work in Brighton, then exceptions to the geographical area of the city itself can be made.
There would be concerns if a project failed to reach beneficiaries within the city at the expense of those from outside the city. For example, if a project’s target group is individuals in a specific disadvantaged area, there would be concerns if it was instead attracting service users from other areas of the city (or even beyond Brighton & Hove generally) or outside the city itself.
Beneficiaries that are attending school in Brighton/Hove (so long as they are aged 16 or over), or make regular use of the city for everyday activities, or live in surrounding areas such as Lewis or Peacehaven, are legible to engage with EBH activities.
Homelessness
The following projects target this target group:
Please note that elegibility criteria varies for each project; check the relevant project page for more detail.
LGBT
Projects that target this target group include:
Eligibility Criteria
16-25 NEET refers to service users who are between the ages of 16 and 25 and not in education, employment or training (NEET).
16 to 25 year olds who are already engaged in some kind of training or who are employed are not part of Equal Brighton & Hove's target groups and are hence not elegibile for funding under this programme unless they fit under any of the other target groups covered by the programme.
Projects that target 16-25 NEETs include:
Please note that many of these projects have joint eligibility criteria with other EBH target groups - please check relevant pages for details.
Disadvantaged Areas - Overview
Originally the target group for people living is specific areas of the city that had higher levels of unemployment or specific needs was "concentrations of worklessness".
Unfortunately this was an ill-defined term and caused a great deal of confusion. “Concentrations of worklessness” has a very specific meaning and is based on Super Output Areas. This is not what was intended when the EMP adopted this group. Furthermore, it cannot be feasibly evidenced.
This term was replaced with Disadvantaged Areas. The 13 prioritised neighbourhoods are included in this area in respect to Equal Brighton and Hove:
And the following five neighbourhoods within the eb4U area are also included with respect to Equal Brighton and Hove:
Eligibility Criteria
Membership in this target group can be evidenced by the beneficiary’s post code and can be verified on CityStats. No individual post code list is available. People who live within these areas are eligible to enrol on EBH-funded projects.
Projects
The following projects target disadvantaged areas:
Research
Research relating to employability and disadvantaged areas includes:
.
People Aged 50+
Potential service users must be aged 50 or over. Anyone below this age is not eligible for EBH funding under this target group.
Projects that directly target people within this target group are:
Research
CROW Seminar
The Centre for Research Into Older Workers (CROW) ran a workshop for Equal projects on the 7th November 2007. The presentations for this event are available to download in Powerpoint Show (PPS) format below.
Drug and Alcohol Misuse Overview
Projects that directly target people within this target group are:
.
Research
Information about barriers to employment faced by this target group can be found on the following pages:
Disabilities
The elegibility criteria for having a disability is in-line with that of the Disability Rights Commission who state that a disability is:
For more information visit the Disability Rights Commission, or their 'What is a Disability Page'.
Projects
The following projects target this target group:
Elegibility criteria may vary from project to project; visit the appropriate project page for more information.
Research
Sources of research relating to barriers to employment and disability include:
Mental Health
The following projects are targeting this group:
Eligibility criteria may vary from project to project; please refer to relevant project pages for more information.
Previous Offenders
The following projects are targeting this group:
Eligibility criteria may vary from project to project; please refer to relevant project pages for more information.
Research
Information about barriers to employment faced by this target group can be found on the following pages:
Refugees
The following projects aim to work primarily with refugees:
Research
Information about barriers to employment faced by this target group can be found on the following pages: