Q:alliance

From The Festival of Womanhood Committee:

To celebrate International Women’s Day a ‘Festival of Womanhood’ will be held on Saturday 6th March from 11-3pm at Radcliffe School, Wolverton. The focus for the event will be celebrating womanhood and what women share as daughters, wives, mothers and grandmothers, crossing over different nationalities and cultures.

We would like to take this opportunity to invite you to our event and hope that you would be interested in supporting or contributing to the day. We are looking for anything that will help us celebrate being Women, such as taster exercise sessions, information stalls, health and advice, cultural stalls, hair, beauty and therapy, fashion, crafts.

If you know of anybody or can help yourself  or if you have any ideas and would like to join us please get in touch with Mrs M Tumulty at Radcliffe School on 01908 682 208 or Tracy Whitmore, MKCVO Community Mobiliser on 07738 405378.

We want to make this an Annual celebration that women will talk about for years to come!

We look forward to hearing from you

Festival of Womanhood Committee

You are invited to the LGBT General Assembly to be held in Milton Keynes on January 30th from 10.00 am to 4.00 pm at the Ridgeway Community Centre (33 Dulverton Drive, Furzton, Milton Keynes MK4 1NA).

Many organisations are interested in the LGBT community. Who is offering what? What is out there? How can you participate in what already exists?

The objective is to bring together all those who are interested in the LGBT community in the area and facilitate communication. If you are interested in the LGBT community or in finding out what there is; whether you are lesbian, gay, bi- or trans, or whether you are interested, concerned or related to someone who is, come and join us for the day.

The day will include presentations by over twenty organisations that are organising or offering services, events or activities to the LGBT community.

During the day, you will have the opportunity to circulate, listen to the presentations which you believe may be of interest to you, and meet people.

Of particular interest will be a debate with questions and answers between local parliamentary candidates from the three main national parties and a projection of Olivia Humphreys “Latecomers” about older people coming out.

For more information, please contact PeterJLeeson {at} hotmail(.)com

This meeting is provided free of charge to all participants, no financial assistance to the costs of the day can be provided to the groups making presentations. It is recommended that participants bring a packed lunch. Coffee and tea will be available on site; doughnuts will be on sale for £1.00 each. Contributions towards the cost of organising are welcome.

Public Transport:

Free Rainbow Bus to pickup participants from  The Point, CMK at 9:30am.

Public Transport: MK Metro bus 7A from City Centre to Dulverton Drive.

Our LGBT Events Calendar has regularly updated details of events that are specifically aimed at lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people in Milton Keynes, or general events that incorporate a specific LGBT-relevant aspect.

Over the next few weeks theres a wide range of events, including social opportunities, walking groups, HIV Quicktesting, pub nights, counselling, meals out, the LGBT General Assembly (which is going to be HUGE – click here for details), International Day Against Homophobia in Football and a fantastic event looking at the life of Alan Turing at Bletchley Park in honour of LGBT History Month – check the calendar for details. If you have, or know of, an event that should be listed here, please email us at website {at} qalliance.org(.)uk.

Please note that try to provide accurate listings, but always get in contact with the event organiser to double check. Not all social groups are listed on the calendar, for a full list of groups that we know of in the area click here. Unless otherwise noted, the events are not run by Q:alliance.

In addition to the events listed, Pink Punters, the local LGBT club, is open Thurs-Sun from 9pm. For more details on Pink Punters visit www.pinkpunters.com.

Are you interested in helping set policy for dealing with LGBT Hate Crime in Milton Keynes?

Do you have 4 hours a month to spare?

Q:alliance is looking for a representative for the LGBT community on the MK Anti-Hate Crime Policy Group…

Role: MK Anti Hate Crime Policy Group LGBT Rep.

The job: Attend the 6 weekly hate-crime policy group in MK, canvas the views of LGBT people in MK on Hate Crime Policy, contribute on the LGBT/homophobia/transphobia perspective at the meetings and then report back to LGBT communities in MK via Q:alliance’s website, Facebook, etc.

Time commitment: 4 hours a month.

Skills needed: Awareness of and ability to take a collaborative approach to tackling racist, homophobic, disablist and transphobic incidents. Confident, good communicator. Strategic thinker.

Other info: Representatives from police, community safety, housing, probation and MK Equalities Council commenting on policy and ways to increase reports of hate-crime. Daytime meetings – usually 2 – 4pm in Acorn House, Midsummer Blvd CMK. Q:alliance can provide background and training.

For  further details: email Gwil Roberts (a Q:alliance Trustee) at gwilym.roberts {at} relatemk(.)org  or visit SaferMK.

A report from one of our volunteers who attended the consultation event for people living with HIV/AIDS in Milton Keynes:

I attended a conference on 1st Dec to look at what’s out there for people living with HIV in Milton Keynes. We had an interesting presentation by a HIV support organisation from Leicester which showed us what a good service looks like and spent time looking at what our needs were to live happily with HIV in MK.

Over half the people at the event were living with HIV, there was only one local gay positive man – most of the others were African people and there were a small number of white heterosexual women too.

It felt exciting to be in a safe space where people could talk honestly about their HIV status – their lives and the way they (often) need to keep it secret to avoid social stigma.

It was clear that there were vastly different needs for the different groups (gay men will often need different messages and services to African women) and also different needs at different stages – a newly diagnosed person will need very different things to someone who’s been on therapy for 10 years.

I was struck by the lack of communication at strategic level between people interested in HIV prevention and those interested in care services. This needs changing.

I was also struck by the importance of communications and advertising – most positive people in MK are unaware of the services available to them – we all need to get better at telling people about whet we do.

I was pleased to learn that MK has some specialist services – but I really don’t blame the (many) gay men I know who choose to access stuff in London – they just have more experience and resources there.

So, where’s it all going? If you are living with HIV and would like to tell us what you think of current services in MK, please get in touch (we will not share your details with anyone) – Q:alliance can let you know who’s out there to help or even talk directly to commissioners on your behalf if you prefer.

In the meantime, watch this space for news of NEW outreach in MK’s popular cruising areas next year and regular visits to Pink Punters.

Current HIV services in MK include:

• STaSS – HIV support organiastion
• H4 – Counselling for people living with HIV
• HIV Quick Testing – Free and confidential testing

We have an updated Current Services leaflet containing details of all our current services. It would really help us if you could print this off and help distribute it in appropriate locations (e.g. your local GP surgery).

If you would like us to print of copies to send to you (or to pick up from CMK) please email info {at} qalliance.org(.)uk with the number of copies you require, where you’ll be putting them and a postal address to send them to or when you’d like to pick them up. We have arranged with Milton Keynes Council of Voluntary Organisations to enable you to pick them up from Acorn House, just opposite The Hub on Midsummer Boulevard (map link).

Click to download (65kb PDF File)