Volunteer for us
CAN is keen to actively involve volunteers in our work. We currently have a number of opportunities within our services and projects:
Community Energy Agents
Community Action Northumberland (CAN) is working in partnership with the Community Action Partnership (CAP) - a joint initiative by charity National Energy Action (NEA) and British Gas - to help mobilise local communities to tackle fuel poverty. We are recruiting volunteers to act as ‘Community Agents’ who will be trained to help people stay warm and well in their homes over winter, from how to improve energy efficiency in the home, to efficient use of household appliances and advice on energy bills. Once trained, they will work across the region to provide support to vulnerable and hard-to-reach groups. The community energy agents will also help to distribute energy monitors, offered free of charge by British Gas. The monitors, which display electricity usage in real time, will help local residents keep track of their usage, and encourage them to think about ways to run their homes more energy efficiently.
If you are interested in the role of Community Agent please contact Christine on 01289 304141 or email us through the form on our contact page
Hallmark Visitors
Hallmark is our quality standard scheme for charitably run village halls and community buildings. We recruit and train experienced local village hall trustees to act as peer assessors. The role involves visiting any building applying to the scheme to assess whether they meet the criteria as set out in a predefined checklist, and writing up a short report on their findings. For more details of the scheme click here
If you have current or recent experience of running a community building and would like to apply for the role of Hallmark Visitor, please contact Tracey Morgan on 01670 517178 or email us through the form on our contact page.
OilCAN Co-ordinators
OilCAN is our county wide bulk buying fuel scheme which helps individuals and companies keep down the cost of fuel through collective purchasing. OilCAN Co-ordinators act as a local link to the scheme within a defined geographical area. The role involves encouraging local people to join the scheme, phoning local members in once a month to take their oil order, and emailing the orders directly to our partner AF Affinity by a set deadline. Full training is given and we run regular meetings to bring co-ordinators together for mutual support and to share ideas as to how the scheme can be improved.
If you are interested in becoming and OilCAN co-ordinator, please contact OilCAN on 01670 500812 or by emailing oilcan@ca-north.org.uk.
Unemployment Support Group Volunteers
Our Unemployment Support Group runs every Thursday between 10am and 3pm at Haltwhistle Leisure Centre, and offers unemployed people access to the internet to carry out job searches, training in more effective job-searching skills, help with updating CVs and careers advice. We also aim to support unemployed people to access the help they need cope with other issues they may be facing such as accessing benefits, debt, housing problems, caring responsibilities, long term health and disability issues.
Volunteers can support the project by:
- Supporting the co-ordinator with the smooth running of the scheme – meeting and greeting
- Mentoring members of the group to learn new IT skills
- Helping group members on a one to one basis to access information on careers options or coping with their individual needs.
If you are interested, please contact Julia Plinston on 01670 517178 or email us through the form on our contacts page.