Impact Stories
Reflecting on success: Celebrating the winners of the Hampshire Changemakers Awards 2026
Our next spotlight in this series looking back at the Hampshire Changemakers Awards highlights a leader in community-led collaboration. Kikoi Connection was presented with the Innovation in Community Partnership Award, a category that recognises those who go beyond surface-level engagement to build deep, lasting bridges between people and institutions. Kikoi Connection formed in 2020 and has become a vital advocate for community engagement in Basingstoke and... read more »
When Mary met Rachel
A perfect pairing stemmed from a chance meeting at an Action Hampshire event Solid relationships are formed when two people meet and discover they have something unique to offer each other. After connecting at an Action Hampshire event a few years ago, Mary Needham co-founder of Munch and Rachel Lewis founder of Presenting Your Past have set the ground running with an incredible collaboration. I met with Rachel last week and she enthusiastically explained how this... read more »
What motivated you to become an AH Trustee?
We at Action Hampshire are delighted to share that we have 5 new Trustees! You can read their full bios via this link, and we have compiled some of our favourite quotes from their interview process below. "I consider that Action Hampshire is fantastic organisation that plays a crucial role in the VCSE sector. I have worked with Action Hampshire over the last few years including becoming a SSE Fellow. I am now on... read more »
Connecting our community with transport
The following case study has been kindly provided by MHA Winchester, a key partner in our Communities Tackling Loneliness with Transport project, with the user’s name having been changed and no identifying characteristics are included. Louise has various mental health difficulties that mean getting out of the house is very challenging. We have been working with her over the last few years to establish the best form of support for her but had been unable... read more »
Empowering our community about lifestyle choices and screening
Communities Against Cancer Projects Case Study We at Action Hampshire wanted to thank Carol Borwick, Fundraising Manager, for sharing the following website resource from autism unlimited. Follow this link for Autism Unlimited Testimonials "The autistic adults who have worked on this project have spoken about how they feel they have benefited from learning more about cancer and prevention." "Through our signposting service, Community Connect, between July and November 2022, we had over 60 telephone conversations with... read more »
Creating opportunities for organisations to work together
Action Hampshire is being funded by the Connect Fund to provide accessible information and support in relation to social investment readiness, increase peer connections between VCSE organisations, and create opportunities for organisations to work together. One strand of this programme was facilitated Action Learning Groups for anyone involved in a voluntary, community, or social enterprise organisation. These peer support groups will enable you to use one another’s experiences to help make progress on the issues,... read more »
Prostate cancer research in Basingstoke
Dr. Obrey Alexis and his colleagues from Oxford Brookes University have now completed their report on Raising awareness of prostate cancer with Black communities in Basingstoke. This work was funded by the Wessex Cancer Alliance and supported by the Communities Against Cancer Team at Action Hampshire. Black men are at increased risk of Prostate cancer - 1 in 4 Black men will get prostate cancer, more than any other ethnic group. Black men also... read more »
Nikki's reflections on AWE
The Accelerating Women’s Enterprise (AWE) project has made an incredible impact and difference to the 37 women who have attended the programme since September last year, and we hope that their successes only continue! We have now finished the facilitated delivery with 12 women attending the Accelerator weekend at the Norton Park Hotel last weekend (11th/12th). All participants had been in business for 2+ years to qualify to... read more »
Transport for Loneliness on TV!
Both ITV Meridian and BBC 1 South ran a transport piece on Friday evening following Richard Holden MP’s visit to Age Concern Hampshire at Lockswood last Monday. You can find the links and transcripts below. Thank you to everyone who worked hard to make this happen, and all of those who watched live! Revised ITV Transcript below: Click this link for the ITV playback and transcript. Loneliness and isolation among older people is a huge problem. One... read more »
Susanna Edwards, The School of Creative Wellness
Meet Susanna Edwards, a former university programme leader, created The School of Creative Wellness at the end of 2022 after experiencing poor mental wellbeing after caring for her father through a long period of ill health and finding that her life lacked balance and joy. After re-training as a yoga teacher and rekindling her love of letterpress, Susanna has created ‘Back to You’ and ‘Breathe then Reach’ programmes to help women to find clarity,... read more »
October Books
Southampton’s first Community Share Offer October Books, Southampton’s independent community bookshop launched their Community Share offer on the 1st October. The bookshop bought its own premises in Portswood, Southampton, with the help of their local community back in 2018 when over £300,000 was raised. Not having to pay rent to a distant landlord has meant the business has been more resilient to the financial pressures of the pandemic and the business has seen an increase... read more »
Lily and Lime
A number of years ago I was visited by “an angry mum”, sent to see me to work out how best to complain about the lack of services for her disabled daughter. That’s how I met the fabulous Anita. At the end of our meeting I found myself asking “so why don’t you set up something yourself?” Approach There followed a few meetings where we talked through how she... read more »
Top of the Town
Corinne came to Action Hampshire, one of the Inspiring Enterprise partner organisations, to get support to develop Top of the Town (TotT), an art therapy enterprise based in Basingstoke, Hampshire. TotT will offer art workshops and group activities for vulnerable members of the community who might not otherwise get the opportunity to engage with arts activities. It will also offer services to the general public to generate income that can then be used to fund... read more »
Community Business Trade Up Programme
Danny Dawes the Founder of Grandad's Front Room has an inherent passion to support people in urgent need in a variety of ways. Grandad’s Front Room is a community support shop whose aim is to support local community groups/charities through actions that make a difference. Their mission is to enable and empower individuals, families, community groups in Bognor Regis and surrounding area without prejudice of ANY form. They operate on a not-for-profit basis helping those that... read more »
Enterprise Essentials Workshops
Ashlene was particularly motivated to begin something new as a response to her addiction, to create a living for herself and to also give others the opportunity to change their lives for the better. Ashlene identified the Inspiring Enterprise programme as being a perfect springboard. Approach Ashlene attended two Enterprise Essentials workshop organised by Action Hampshire in January 2019. These workshops covered the basics of starting a social enterprise, including idea generation, business and financial planning... read more »
Young Mums from Basingstoke Domestic Abuse Refuge
The Inspiring Enterprise Programme funded by the Big Lottery and European Social Fund aims to give individuals who are not in earned income to have the opportunity of finding out how to set up a social enterprise with a view of starting their own business, go on to further training or gain more confidence in order to get a job. Approach We worked with a group of young mums from the Domestic Abuse Refuge in Basingstoke... read more »
Jacob's Farewell to AH
Meet Jacob! My time at Action Hampshire (AH) has been a time of learning, personal growth and exciting day-to-day challenges keeping me on my toes. I got the job via the Government’s Kickstart Scheme and a bit of charm! Prior to this, I was working within the care sector as a carer and caterer, as I've always taken a professional pleasure in helping those who need it. As a result, the charity sector was a... read more »
Hampshire Rural Forum
What do we do? Action Hampshire took on the secretariat role from Hampshire County Council in January 2018. Our role is to support the Chair and the functions of the Forum. Currently there are three meetings a year – we beaver away in the background to make these happen and we plan the themed sessions when members explore a particular topic of interest (such as fly tipping, broadband speeds or environmental policies) . Action Hampshire... read more »
Action Man Campaign
WCT have used its Communities Against Cancer grant to raise awareness of cancer amongst men and encourage those with possible symptoms to come forward. Through its research into men’s experiences, WCT found that men are more likely to be diagnosed with cancer but also less likely to come forward and speak to their GP. WCT identified that there may be many men out there who have possible cancer symptoms and have not got their symptoms... read more »
Health in Mid-Hampshire
There were two main strands to this project: older people’s experiences of healthcare social isolation Older People’s experiences of local healthcare Carrying out in-depth interviews with 34 local older people to better understand their experiences of health interventions and what could have improved them. We focussed on older people with multiple heath conditions – physical and/or mental. You can download the resulting reports here: In their own words (Summary), available via this... read more »
Hampshire Fire & Rescue
They were keen to hear from people whose voices are less often heard. Would the restructure have any additional or different impacts on these communities? And how could these insights help to inform the implementation process? So they came to Action Hampshire and asked if we could help in some way. Our Research & Engagement Team loves finding solutions to tricky problems, so we jumped at the chance. Approach After some discussions and refining, we came up... read more »
The experiences of Hampshire's voluntary sector
Lloyds Bank Foundation recently published a report: “Commissioning in Crisis. How current contracting and procurement processes threaten the survival of small charities”. You can read the full report via this link. They carried out research with a range of smaller charities across the UK. The report made alarming reading, so Action Hampshire carried out its own survey to see if findings were replicated at a local level in Hampshire. Approach An online survey was circulated around... read more »