The South Asian Forum aims to build a stronger collective voice of South Asian community groups and leaders to address inequalities in Rochdale Borough. The Forum brings together local VCFSE organisations, community leaders and public sector partners to enable collaboration around health and wider racial inequalities.
The Forum aims to:
- Strengthen the voice of South Asian community groups and leaders
- Build stronger relationships between South Asian community organisations and statutory partners
- Work alongside Public Health to review data, and lead a community-driven needs assessment to identify, and act on, South Asian communities’ priorities
- Co-design grant fund programmes relating to key inequalities such as covid vaccines or drug and alcohol treatment
- Collaborate with Rochdale Council of Mosques, the Rochdale Ethnic Communities Network and the Community Influencers Forum to share insights and learning as part of borough-wide action and influencing spaces
Our work so far
The South Asian Forum was launched in May 2025 thanks to funding from NHS GM. A key aim of the Forum is to demonstrate that the most effective way to shift health inequalities is to build stronger, trusting relationships and work in partnership with communities. Quarterly sessions have taken place since then.
The idea for the Forum came from a workshop with local South Asian led organisations who had been funded through three rounds of ‘South Asian Health Engagement’ funding. VCFSE and community leaders identified some key challenges they wanted to address:
- Some groups become the ‘go to’ for the community, even if they aren’t representative of the diverse local South Asian population
- Engagement happens when it suits the public sector, not on the terms of the local community
- The Rochdale Ethnic Communities Network brings together all communities experiencing racial inequalities, but there isn’t a space just for South Asian groups, community leaders and spaces of worship to have a stronger collective voice
- VCFSE groups want to understand and feel a stronger sense of ownership of the data about their community
The South Asian Forum is a space to address these challenges and build a stronger collective voice for South Asian VCFSE organisations and community leaders.
The South Asian Forum and the Ethnic Communities Network have also been instrumental in co-designing and implementing the Health Inequalities Fund.
Many communities across Greater Manchester continue to face health inequalities and high levels of deprivation. This funding aimed to improve access and reduce these inequalities in groups with low engagement and uptake - particularly in relation to the Covid-19 vaccine.
Learning from the Forum
Addressing a legacy of racism | The South Asian Forum is deeply rooted in anti-racism principles and aims to address the structural inequalities that have historically limited community trust and participation.
By Spring 2025, for reasons outlined in the statement here, it was important to spend time listening more deeply to the frustrations of the group and the communities represented by members. The frustrations were not just with the “here and now” of the funding and projects, but relate to the experiences and inherited trauma of generations of structural racism in the borough.
The Process | Deep Listening
The session was organised into themes, focusing on hearing different views of the participants without necessarily reaching any kind of consensus. The session was supported by a “Deep Listening” tool, which had been co-produced locally as part of the wider health equity programme in the borough. This enables participants in a workshop to speak freely and, without the need for them to answer specific questions or address any particular point. They can just speak about how they feel and what’s important and a facilitator is appointed to take verbatim notes of what is said, analysing this in real time into a group statement which brings all of the views together, enabling actions to be drawn out which are true to the intent of the speaker(s).
The Statement | Collective Words
The statement was written up onto a piece of cloth so that it could be used in subsequent sessions as a reminder of what’s been said and heard. It is important that people don’t have to experience that sense of not being sure whether they’ve been listened to, which can be re-traumatising and frustrating.
The cloth can be added to as time goes on, to include people who weren’t at the original session: they can see and hear what’s already come up, add points, and come back to the things that are important as the work goes on.
Here's a snapshot of the powerful feedback shared during our Co-design Session;
"We care about the experience of health inequalities in South Asian Communities. We have been doing this work, some of us, for up to 40, 50 years. We have the relationships, the trust, the connections and the history."
"We care deeply that people, families and communities are understood and strengthened."
"We have many people, many strengths: people who are very passionate about trying to make a difference: trying to move forward. There are massively strong and deep trusted links, for example, in the women’s work that is happening."
Recent Work
Key Themes:
- Healing historical harm – addressing the legacy of community mistrust toward systems
- Ending coercion – promoting voluntary, collaborative approaches rather than imposed agendas
- Building community infrastructure – investing in long-term sustainability
- Creating spaces to feel heard – recognising and acting on personal and collective experiences of marginalisation
- Celebrating wins and influence – recognising progress as a foundation for empowerment
- Bridging systems – defining what equitable partnership truly looks like
Community Health Champions
Our South Asian Forum is working closely with the Rochdale Council of Mosques with the proposal of identifying mosque volunteers and co-ordinators who could be 'Community Health Champions' and growing their confidence, skills and capacity.
These key volunteers will be invited to join a community leadership programme focusing on topics such as; Developing community ideas, turning ideas into action, engaging volunteers, managing projects, and applying for funding.
There will be ongoing check-ins and support for the Community Health Champions to continue developing their confidence, growing the capacity of the group within their Mosque, and demonstrating the impact of their project.
Community-Led Needs Assessment
Following several of the sessions, where participants shared data and experiences, work is now taking place to develop a 'Community-Led Needs Assessment' which will be used to inform Public Health.
One of the key points raised in the early SAF meetings, was the fact that the council and system partners hold data and intelligence relating to South Asian communities and the inequalities that are experienced. The group shared that this creates a power imbalance, when the to which the data relates, are unable to see or understand the intelligence that is held. Improving access to this data and intelligence also supports the development of funding bids.
A network of analysts in the council have come together to start pulling together the data
and intelligence relating to South Asian communities, that is held by the council or is
publicly available.
An interactive dashboard has been developed that will be kept up to date and can be
accessed HERE (external website). During the session the dashboard
was shared with guidance on how to access and use the information that is held. There
were also more in-depth discussions on some of the key strengths and challenges that the
data highlighted. A follow up session has been planned to share further information on
crime and safety data, and also to agree on an initial priority that will be the focus of a
community led needs assessment.
The next phase of this programme of work will be for the community to identify a priority from the data and to work with colleagues in public health to undertake a needs assessment.
Influence and Impact
Despite having run for less than a year, the South Asian Forum can already point to the influence it has had locally.
Strategic Influence
The Chief Executive of the Council attended the South Asian Forum in July 2025 to hear directly from members about their experiences of racial inequalities and coercion by the public sector, as set out in the statement above.
The Forum was also part of shaping the Council’s ‘Co-operative Communities’ model and feeding into research around a local definition of Community Power. This led to one of the key aspects of growing community power to be defined as building capacity for anti-racist and other important equity practices.
The work of the South Asian Forum for health inequalities, and other groups involved in the health inequalities work has significantly influenced the Live Well plan. This includes ensuring there is accountability to the intent behind actions in the plan. It also includes paying attention to communities of identity and experience, as well as the geographic communities, in the borough’s neighbourhoods.
Co-designing Grant Programmes
The South Asian Forum led on the co-design for the Health Inequalities Fund, in collaboration with the Rochdale Ethnic Communities Network. The grant aims to address the low uptake in Covid vaccinations from communities experiencing racial inequalities but through a focus on wider inequalities.
We want to demonstrate the impact that can be achieved when communities feel empowered and heard. We want to use this as a blueprint to showcase how equitable partnership can have varied benefits when done properly.
The Forum also worked with Public Health to co-design a fund to address inequalities of access to drug and alcohol treatment.
Shaping Local Priorities and Action
A key message from local community leaders was about data and how to give South Asian communities access to the information held about them, so that communities could work alongside the public sector to set priorities.
The initial workshop to develop the South Asian Strengths and Needs Assessment was held in October 2025. Public Health presented various data and meaningful discussions took place around authenticity, accuracy, validity and access of data.
This work will continue in 2026.
Next Meeting Dates:
The dates for our next South Asian Forum will be listed below once confirmed.
Rochdale South Asian Forum, April 2026
Date/time: Wednesday 1 April 2026, 1pm to 3pm
Location: Aspire Youth Zone, Rochdale OL16 2DR