Well London uses Participatory Budgeting to improve health and wellbeing

Running over a number of years the Well London health and wellbeing initiative has been using participatory budgeting styled events to select projects for support, using money from the National Lottery and other local funding sources. Across a wide number of areas hundreds of people have been engaged in projects that bring wellbeing.

As reported on the Well London website… “in July 2014, Well London launched in Bethnal Green. The Well London team spoke to more than 100 residents and asked them about the health needs of their community as part of the community engagement process. Since then, 10 new projects have been identified, and are due to run throughout 2015 as part of the Well London Programme in Old Bethnal Green.

The community voted for all of these projects during a local ‘scoring’ event which took place in November 2014, and was a great success with food, music and lots and lots of people. Some projects have already started, many are still to take place. Well London volunteers will be leading homework clubs, walking clubs, cooking on a budget, Sew and Mend, keep fit classes, and much, much more for local residents to enjoy. These projects will all aim to share skills, stay healthy, have fun, and bring the community together across age, culture and ethnicity.”

Well London provides a framework for communities and local organisations to work together to improve health and well-being, build resilience and reduce inequalities. Their approach engages the most disadvantaged communities and empowers people to:

• build their individual and community capacity for health, well-being and resilience.

• engage, shape and take action on specific health and well-being needs and issues.

Importantly, Well London integrates with and adds value to what is already going on locally to maximize resources and ensure value for money. Development of Well London has been supported by Big Lottery Wellbeing funding and the Greater London Authority (GLA) has acted as accountable body and overall Programme Management for the Lottery funding since 2007