We want to improve the lives of our residents, from the youngest to the oldest. We want to create communities where everyone can thrive, where essential services are accessible, where people can enjoy life at any age and where people look out for each other. 

Strong communities foster social support, enhance well-being, and create a sense of belonging, which collectively contribute to a more resilient and cohesive society. 

We want public sector resources to be used as effectively as possible to meet local needs, and we need to redesign how the council works with communities.

This Council Plan priority will be shaped through co-design with partners and communities themselves. It will align with Dorset’s Integrated Care Partnership strategy. This section sets out our direction of travel. The Council Plan will be updated once the co-design work has been completed.

The challenge

Dorset has many strong communities, with an active voluntary and community sector and over 160 town and parish councils. However, the population and world are changing rapidly, and our communities need support to adapt to the challenges ahead.

Dorset has the oldest demographic of any county in the UK. 29.5% of our population are aged over 60, compared to an average of 19% nationally. As people age, we often need more health and care support, which, unless addressed at an early stage, can put more pressure on already-stretched services. Meanwhile, younger people often move away due to lack of opportunities, low wages and high housing costs, reducing our working age population. 

There are also widespread disparities across our area. Our 2023 residents’ survey shows significant differences in how residents from different areas view the quality of council services. Some communities are calling for us to work differently to better understand and meet the needs of towns and villages. Some of our town and parish councils are also calling for better partnership working.

South Dorset is the least socially mobile constituency in the country. Social mobility is the link between a person's occupation or income with that of their parents. Many of our communities face deep poverty having experienced hardships for decades, repeatedly appearing in the bottom national measurement for deprivation. There are also areas of poverty in wealthier rural areas, with data averages masking large income inequalities. 

Health inequalities are the unfair and avoidable differences in people’s health across social groups and between different populations. In Dorset people are generally healthier and live for longer than England overall; 1.8 years longer for both men and women. However, the length of time people in Dorset live is closely related to the extent of disadvantage and deprivation they experience. Males living in the least deprived areas live on average 5.5 years longer and females 4.9 years longer, than those living in the most deprived areas.  

Healthy life expectancy is a measure of how long people can expect to live a healthy life before decline and frailty sets in and is also affected by deprivation and disadvantage. The amount of time spent living in good health before long-term health conditions appear varies greatly across Dorset. People experiencing long-term health conditions affects economic growth and productivity in working-age adults.  

Finally, our residents’ survey highlighted issues of community cohesion – also evidenced through local protests in August 2024. While three quarters of Dorset’s residents feel that they belong in their community, fewer than half (49%) of ethnic minority residents feel the same. In Weymouth and Portland, only 44% of residents feel that people from different backgrounds get on in their local area.

Our approach

The ‘communities for all’ priority is where our themes of ‘prevention’ and ‘partnership’ come most strongly into play.

We believe strong communities have a vital role in preventing crises from happening, both personal and community crises. They are essential responders during crises of all kinds. When people in communities are well-connected and supportive, they can better mobilise resources, provide mutual support, and recover more quickly. This helps ensure our most vulnerable residents receive help from people they know and trust. When residents are connected and look out for one another, communities thrive. 

We need to reduce the various inequalities between different groups, giving more equal access to opportunities, and supporting more cohesive communities. We want our services and infrastructure to be age and disability friendly, where people of all abilities and ages can stay in the homes and communities they prefer for as long as they want, reducing the need for major life change or expensive care.

This requires a different way of working with partners and in localities across our area. It requires a comprehensive and joined-up response across public sector, the voluntary and community sector (VCS), with local businesses, and other partners to address social, economic, and infrastructure challenges. We want to build on, accelerate and enhance our approach to place-based working, which is about ‘working with’ and ‘not ‘doing to’ people and our communities.

Improvements to health, social mobility, inclusion, and reduced poverty not only benefit individuals and families but also support the wellbeing, resilience and prosperity of a whole community. In turn, this can also achieve a more sustainable model for statutory health and care services.

Target measures

  • a joined-up model of locality working, delivering through prevention and partnership: measures to be agreed with local partners and linked back to our priorities and the work of the NHS, the Health & Wellbeing Board and the Integrated Care Partnership
  • improve educational attainment by working through leadership in the education community: increase Dorset’s Key Stage 2 results (55% in 2024) to be as good or better than the national average levels by 2029 (60% in 2024) 
  • transfer up to £500k a year of Dorset Council's apprenticeship levy to increase the number of apprenticeships offered by local businesses and organisations 
  • be the best Corporate Parent that we can for our children in care and care leavers. Improve levels of engagement in employment, education, and training among our care leavers to 65% through provision of good, stable, and consistent care and accommodation, good multi-agency wraparound support, and a sufficient number and range of opportunities
  • seek internationally recognised accreditation as an ‘age-friendly’ county 
  • work specifically with those groups at higher risk, including supporting unpaid carers, those ageing without children and those ageing alone
  • increase the number of age and disability friendly environments to enable people to stay in the homes they want for longer, reducing the proportion of people in traditional care settings, as well as creating all-age friendly environments, equally accessible by young parents with pushchairs as they are to older people with walkers or disabled people

Key actions to deliver this priority

  • prevention and early help: listen to and involve residents in decisions about their health and wellbeing, and care and support needs. Use data to better understand current needs and identify potential issues before they become problems. We will make changes when needed to improve people’s outcomes, access or experience, to improve equity and reduce inequalities in health
  • thriving communities: work more closely with town and parish councils and with voluntary and community sector organisations to support residents, investing in the infrastructure
  • work better together: put people’s and communities’ needs at the heart of how we plan care and support. Work with Integrated Care System partner organisations to provide care as close as possible to those who need it. We value the strength of voluntary and community organisations in this partnership
  • commissioning and procurement: co-design and deliver with communities and partners on a locality basis, devolving funding to neighbourhoods where appropriate
  • change the culture: focus on people first and act on feedback about quality of services and experience 
  • simplify our approach to communities so it is consistent: a more joined-up and coherent model of place-based working, building on existing arrangements, developing strong relationships locally, and using existing assets in communities, such as libraries and family hubs. This will be built into our new target operating model (this sets out how we will introduce new ways of working with residents and communities)
  • strengthen and simplify the connection between Dorset Council and the voluntary and community sector through an active assembly, including simplifying access to funding 
  • engage with people closer to home, with dignity and respect: be honest about options and involve people in decisions
  • support people of working age who are economically inactive to address barriers to employment
  • devolve or transfer more assets to communities to enable creation of local hubs where people can access support and care
  • through the collective efforts to deliver on the Council Plan priorities of ‘provide high-quality housing’, ‘grow our economy’, and ‘communities for all, we aim to improve social mobility and reduce poverty in the Dorset Council area 

Leadership and partnership

  • we have been a trailblazer working on the government’s Families First for Children Pathfinder. We will continue to work very closely with our partners in health, the police, education and the voluntary sector to put families at the centre of changes to the delivery of support they receive from us and our partners
  • recognising our unique demographic, we aim to lead the UK in how we support people of all ages, abilities and backgrounds, within an ageing population
  • we will combat stigmatising attitudes and behaviours, and encourage intergenerational activities
  • play a clear role in building new health and care teams in neighbourhoods, working with the NHS, residents and communities
  • continue to work in partnership with Dorset Police on community safety

Standing up for Dorset

  • call on the government for fairer funding for Dorset schools and for children with special educational needs
  • influence government on issues of healthy ageing and disability
  • work with NHS, business, community partners and others to maximise income to support the health needs of our population and develop new and innovative models of preventative work
  • promote Dorset as a great place to live and work, recognising the “grey economy”, identifying age-appropriate employment opportunities and recruiting a younger workforce through developing training opportunities within the county.