Glossary

Glossary

• Capacity building: the process of developing and strengthening the skills, abilities, and resources that organisations, communities, or individuals need to adapt and thrive in a changing environment. This can involve training, education, and other forms of support to enhance their effectiveness and sustainability. More information on our definition.
• Collaborative Working: Also known as joint or partnership working - covers a variety of ways that two or more organisations can work together.
• Constitution: The aims and rules that a group will use. It's a statement of what the group is going to do and how it is going to do it. A constitution should provide the structure for an organisation, describe its purpose, and define the duties and responsibilities of the officers and members.
• Infrastructure support: The provision of essential services, facilities, and systems necessary for the functioning and development of an organisation, community, or society. More information on our definition.
• Intersectionality: The interconnected nature of social identities such as race, gender, sexuality and disability, which can create overlapping systems of disadvantage or discrimination.
• LGBTQ+: An umbrella term referring to people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning, and others with diverse sexual orientations and gender identities.
• Match Funding: Funds that are set to be paid in proportion to funds available from other sources.
• Mayor and Cabinet: Makes the decisions on strategy, policy, service provision and finance and ensures that the council is run in accordance with the relevant statutory guidance and legislation.
• Member: A locally elected Ward Councillor representing the local community.
• Protected Characteristics: There are nine protected characteristics in the Equality Act. Discrimination that happens because of one or more of these characteristics is unlawful under the Act. The characteristics are: age, disability, gender reassignment, marriage and civil partnership, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, and sexual orientation.
• Stronger Communities Partnership Board: A strategic forum in Lewisham that brings together the local authority, health partners, and the voluntary and community sector (VCS) to develop joint actions and inform strategic development.
• Terms of Reference: Define the purpose and structures of a project, committee, meeting, negotiation, or any similar collection of people who have agreed to work together to accomplish a shared goal.
• Trans / transgender: People whose gender identity is different from the sex they were assigned at birth. This includes non-binary people.
• Ward: An electoral district within the borough represented by two or three councillors. The ward boundaries in Lewisham were changed in 2022.