Terms of Reference
‘Voice of Warwickshire' is a residents’ panel with members broadly representative of Warwickshire population.
Aims of the Panel
- To provide a representative voice from a wide cross section of the community in Warwickshire.
- To help Warwickshire County Council deliver the Council Plan by collecting views on key topics.
- To provide Warwickshire County Council with insight about residents’ opinions to support and improve their decision making. It is not a decision-making body.
- To ensure members have a positive experience of engaging with the council about the things that are important to them.
- To help Warwickshire County Council to understand how a Residents’ Panel can best be delivered and managed in the future.
Membership
As a member of the Panel, you will be helping Warwickshire County Council (WCC) to deliver the Council Plan by sharing your views and opinions on the decisions that will affect Warwickshire and the area where you live.
To be eligible to join the panel:
- Members of the Panel must live in Warwickshire
- 18 Years or older
If you are under 18 please email childfriendly@warwickshire.gov.uk for more information about how you can get involved in other ways.
Panel members will have the opportunity to:
- share your opinions and experiences of living in Warwickshire.
- give your views on key issues that impact you, your family, friends, and communities.
- help inform Warwickshire County Council's policymaking based on your experiences.
If any member wishes to leave the panel, they are requested to email voiceofwarwickshire@warwickshire.gov.uk to let the project team know. Resident details will be removed from our database and no further requests to engage in panel activities will be sent.
Role of members
Members of the Panel will be asked to:
- Sign up to be a member of the Panel for minimum of 12 months.
- Advise WCC of any changes to contact details or address, or if they no longer wish to be part of the Panel at the earliest opportunity.
- Participate in as many core activities as they can over the 12-month period to share their views and opinions on the topics.
- Provide their own views and not pass on links / enable any other person to take part.
- Respond to activities in an appropriate manner and not to include malicious comments, anti-social/offensive language such as swearing, or language that is discriminatory. If participating in optional group activities members are expected to respect other people and their views and contribute to a positive discussion. This does not preclude members from disagreeing on issues, but it does mean all members must feel comfortable presenting a different view to the group.
- Members must not speak in a way that might be perceived as bullying, abusive, discriminating, or derogatory. We also ask members to respect each other’s confidentiality and not discuss identifiable individuals after any activity.
Role of Warwickshire County Council
WCC will:
- Keep Panel members’ information confidential and secure and will not share this information with any third parties
- Ensure individual member responses are kept confidential. (Where applicable individual comments may be included in reports. These will always be anonymous and will never include any personally identifiable information).
- Provide the information and time the Panel needs to enable them to consider and respond to activities.
- Ensure all Panel members can take part in activities and adjustments and alternative formats are made reasonably available.
- Analyse all feedback and report this transparently to participants and to WCC Corporate Board, councillors and relevant Officers as appropriate.
- Ensure members are kept informed about how their feedback has been listened to and how it has influenced decisions.
- Ensure continuity of contact and support for members through a dedicated Panel Manager.
Activities
The main method for taking part in activities will be on-line surveys.
There may also be opportunities to take part in online forums or in face–to-face or online discussions. Members have indicated whether such activities are of interest or not.
Communications
The primary method for communication to panel members will be by email, unless other method requested.
Warwickshire County Council will:
- send panellist's regular feedback.
- update a dedicated webpage.
- keep in touch by producing newsletters.
Members can contact the panel manager via voiceofwarwickshire@warwickshire.gov.uk or 01926 742031
Panel Management
- Your details will not be used for any other purpose other than the residents’ panel.
- Your personal details will be stored securely and held separately from any questionnaire returns so that your individual views and opinions will remain anonymous.
- All panel surveys will be treated in the strictest of confidence and will only be used to monitor the way Warwickshire County Council deliver our services. All data stored through surveys will comply with GDPR regulations and privacy policies set by Warwickshire County Council -available here.
- Review of terms of reference annually or amended as necessary and will be available on the webpage.