Together we can

It's one year since the government launched the Together we Can initiative and DCLG Minister Ruth Kelly has praised the results in annual review.

Ruth Kelly today renewed her department's commitment to ensuring residents are involved in shaping local policies so they make a real difference to people's lives. Last year, Together We Can set out a cross-government action plan to improve the way people engage with local and central government. The 65 point action plan is helping ministers to join up initiatives across government. Progress on these can be found at the Together We Can website .

Twelve Government departments are taking part in the Together We Can plan to make more opportunities for people to influence policies on citizenship, democracy, health, regeneration, safety and justice.

Interestingly, the DCLG has also published the results of the 2005 Citizenship Survey this week, too. And it looks like not enough people feel they can influence decision making locally:

39 per cent of people in England feel they can influence decisions in their local area, 22 per cent feel they can influence decisions at a national level.

But it beats the national rate. I wonder how many people felt "I can't" and how many felt "I can't be bothered" - I'm not really sure which would be worse.

The survey also shows that people are working to change their local area through voluntary service.

20.4 million adults in England (50 per cent) volunteered regularly in the 12 months before interview. This was an increase on the 18.4 million adults who had volunteered in 2001.

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