Local Involvement Network (LINk)
Have your say in health and social care
Local Involvement Networks (LINks) are independent networks of local people and groups. They were introduced on 1 April 2008 to give you a stronger voice in how local health and social care services are delivered.
The role of LINks is to find out how you would like health and social care services to improve, investigate issues and use its powers to hold services to account. LINks are supported by host organisations.
Camden LINk’s host organisation
The role of the host organisation is to support, facilitate and enable the Local Involvement Network. Also, it will further develop the involvement of local people in Camden in the commissioning, scrutiny and review of health and social care services in Camden.
Following a competitive tendering exercise in 2008, a long term contract for the host organisation was awarded to the Shaw Trust. The contract runs from October 2008 to March 2011.
The competitive tendering exercise tested a range of issues including approach to involvement, partnership working, development of governance arrangements, operational infrastructure and financial robustness.
The Shaw Trust is currently working with Camden LINk members to obtain views about the direction of its work and how it can move forward, building upon the work undertaken to date.
Interim arrangements
Voluntary Action Camden (VAC) acted as the interim host organisation between April to September 2008.
We are very grateful to VAC for its work during the interim period as host organisation for facilitating and developing an interim Camden LINk with a range of local individuals and organisations.
The work VAC undertook with the interim LINk steering group put the Camden LINk in a very good position to continue to evolve into a stronger voice for patients, social care service users, carers, the wider public and the voluntary sector in Camden.
Contact
Contact Camden LINk for more informationBackground
More details about how LINks work is available in Camden LINk update - May 2008:
Shaping Camden's LINk
At the successful event ‘Shaping Camden’s LINk’, held on 6 December 2007, participants talked about how LINk could work.
During the event, topics discussed included some of the issues that our LINk could prioritise and what should characterise the host organisation that we will procure.
A very readable and helpful report from the Camden LINk event was produced by Camden Community Empowerment Network (CCEN), setting out the key issues raised, which we are using to develop documentation for the procurement exercise.
If you would like to know more about the LINk event, you can download our report:
