Who can join West Yorkshire Voice?
Anyone who:
- Lives or works in West Yorkshire (Bradford and District, Calderdale, Craven and District, Kirklees, Leeds, Wakefield District).
- Uses health and care services in West Yorkshire.
- Cares for someone who lives in, or uses services in, West Yorkshire.
Return to the West Yorkshire Voice home page
West Yorkshire voice is made up of:
Individuals- Community groups and organisations
- Existing networks and panels in local places
- NHS patient groups and networks
- Voluntary sector organisations
- Locally elected members
- NHS trust governors
The aim of West Yorkshire Voice is to reflect the diverse population and communities from across West Yorkshire.
Being an individual member
We want people living in West Yorkshire to join in and help us make health and care services better, we will do this by offering:
- Different ways to share feedback: We will offer lots of ways that you can share your views and experiences of health and care services. We want you to be involved and have your say in a way that works for you.
- Newsletter: We will send out a newsletter every three months to give you information and updates on the work we have been doing and how you can get involved in future work.
- Events: We will have events (in person and online) where we will offer different ways for you to give your feedback and contribute your ideas.
- Updates: Through the newsletter and at events, we will also update people about how their feedback has been used to make services better.
- Feedback loop: We will also ask about the changes that have been made. This will help us learn more about how and if things have improved – this is the ‘feedback loop’.
How members can benefit from getting involved:
- Have your say and help to put the voices of ordinary people into the plans for health and care services in your area.
- Speak up and help the people who make decisions about health and care services to hear about what it is like to live with health issues.
- Getting involved can help your self-confidence. You may also build up new skills and connect with people in your community.
- Some people might want to give more of their time and get involved in one of our groups. This involves working more closely with staff talking about the details of the changes we want to make services better. We will make sure this is accessible and help people to get to any meetings so that people won’t have to pay for travel. We can also pay people or offer vouchers for their time and contributions. This will be agreed with the person when they join the group.
Being a group member
The aim of West Yorkshire Voice is to reflect the diverse population and communities from across West Yorkshire. It provides opportunities for people, groups, and organisations to have their say about health and care services. We want to link with all the great work already taking place in local areas, but not duplicate what is already underway.
We want groups and organisations to be involved in a way that works for them, this might be:
- Receiving the quarterly newsletter so that you are informed about involvement opportunities and updates about the impact of previous feedback on services.
- Telling us about any health and care involvement or engagement activities you are running, and we can promote your activity on a local or West Yorkshire wide level.
- Sharing any relevant reports or resources that you have produced or that you want to promote to raise awareness of the issues faced by the communities that you support.
- We can share experiences of health and care services from the communities that you work with and highlight important issues. If there is an issue you want to raise at a West Yorkshire level, we can support this process.
- Linking your networks and groups to West Yorkshire Voice and sharing information about our activities in their local communities.
- Getting involved at our events and work in partnership with us to deliver innovative and accessible community engagement activities.
- Helping us to raise the profile of health inequalities within the project by joining or contributing information to our Health Inequalities Advisory Group.
- Working with us to help the ICB to be accountable to the people of West Yorkshire. Using the ‘feedback loop’ principle we will learn more about how and if things have improved by re-engaging with people to update them and gather their feedback about changes that have been made.