Tier 1

Keynotes

Opening Keynotes and Awards

Monday, 4pm, Ballroom, capacity 600

Join us from 4pm on Monday 16 November for an exciting session opening with a short introduction from our Chief Executive Clare Moriarty, followed by a keynote speech from a high-profile guest speaker. We’ll be announcing more details about our headline speaker soon.

Following the opening keynotes, we’ll celebrate the achievements of our network at the Common ground conference awards, and then round off our first evening with our drinks reception.

Community power for sustainable services

Tuesday, 9.15am, Ballroom, capacity 600

This keynote session will explore our relationship as a civil society organisation to the communities we’re here for. We will consider how local knowledge and community-led approaches to governance, service delivery and commissioning can help us shift the balance of power and better meet community needs. As a key moment in the conference programme, this will be the only session with no other sessions running concurrently, bringing everyone together for a shared conversation.

Turn the tide: Celebration and milestones for our living standards work

Tuesday, 11.15am, Ballroom, capacity 600

What have we achieved together - and where do we go next?

This session will look back at our living standards work, celebrating some of the key milestones, influencing efforts and achievements across the Citizens Advice network. We’ll hear from colleagues who have been part of the work and reflect on the impact we’ve made by coming together around a shared ambition.

We’ll also look ahead to where we go next with our Turn the Tide campaign, and what our data tells us about the issues we should be prioritising. With speakers from across the network, and beyond, this will be a chance to celebrate progress, recognise the contribution of colleagues and think about what comes next.

The future of advice: Technology, prevention and the art of the possible

Tuesday, 1.45pm, Ballroom, capacity 600

Steve Hughes will open the session with a look at the art of the possible when it comes to technology, AI and the future of advice. He’ll explore how new tools and better use of data could change the way we deliver advice and help us move towards more preventative approaches.

Steve will then chair a panel discussion exploring the role of prevention in the future of advice, bringing together different perspectives on how we can identify and address problems earlier. The panel will consider how technology, data and collaboration could help us spot issues sooner, understand what is driving them and connect people to the right support before problems escalate - while keeping advice safe, trusted and focused on the people who rely on our services.

Securing our future: Navigating the changing funding landscape

Tuesday, 3.20pm, Ballroom, capacity 600

How do you build a sustainably funded service whilst fighting fires? This panel will showcase the changing nature of the funding environment, focussing on Public sector commissioning and the growth of a place based approach, pushed (or held back?) by devolution and local government re-organisation. Public sector commissioning is fundamentally changing, presenting both an operational hurdle and a distinct opportunity for the Citizens Advice network. With the Procurement Act 2023 reshaping tendering rules and statutory funding shifting rapidly toward devolved, regional, and sub-regional pots, local Citizens Advice need to adapt their commercial strategies to protect and grow their funding.

Workshops

Building our collective capability and impact in healthcare settings

Tuesday, 11.15am, Tactics, capacity 88

We know that integrating advice across the life journey and partnering well with other providers is critical for improving access, prevention and building lasting skills and capability for the people we help. We can and do deliver impactful advice in healthcare settings, but what steps do we need to take to achieve this at a service-wide level? In this session, co-delivered by national and network leaders, we’ll explore the capabilities, skills and evidence needed to build a compelling case for why our advice should be delivered in healthcare settings.

We’ll learn from local leaders about their experiences of establishing a healthcare offer, consider the external opportunities and internal capabilities to harness, and explore the components needed to build and deliver a service-wide health programme.

Harnessing opportunities of the “devolution revolution”

Tuesday, 1.45pm, Tactics, capacity 88

Creating Number 10 North, empowering the role of mayors, opening up new streams of funding - devolution is already speeding up under Prime Minister Andy Burnham. 
With an ambition to “complete the map” of devolution and move decision-making closer to communities, there are lots of new opportunities for us to showcase the impact of our services and influence regional stakeholders now and in the future. Join this session to be inspired by success stories from the network and discuss how we can most effectively build on our efforts to influence within regions and build sustainable place-based services for communities. 

Live EDI data workshop

Tuesday, 3.20pm, Tactics, capacity 88

Join the EDI Data Session live at conference! The EDI Data Sessions are an opportunity to share the latest updates on our client experience and local workforce data, share research on relevant EDI themes, and develop skills and knowledge on gathering, analysing and using EDI data. The conference session will focus on client experience data, with a local office talking about how they use data and a live demo of how to use the EDI Dashboard. You’ll have the opportunity to ask questions and contribute to our work on building EDI data capability across the service. 

Practical skills: Turning local insight into funding partnerships

Tuesday, 11.15am, Legends Lounge, capacity 88

Funding opportunities begin long before there is a bid to write. This session explores how local Citizens Advice can use community insight, service evidence, existing capabilities and funder insight and relationships  to start productive conversations with those funders, commissioners and partners. After hearing from an LCA and an external decision maker, participants will work through a potential opportunity of their own: identifying what matters to the prospective funder. Shaping a proposition around the outcomes advice can achieve not only for the end users but also importantly to the funder you want to pay for this service. Practising how to open the conversation and develop the pitch.

Communities coming together: What role should Citizens Advice play, and who decides? 

Tuesday, 1.45pm, Legends Lounge, capacity 88

This session will share findings from Agora’s recent reports on community convening and ‘lived experience’, alongside examples of participation in practice within and beyond Citizens Advice. We’ll explore some of the key questions and dilemmas around who convenes, who decides and how we work alongside communities. There will be space to share experiences, explore different perspectives and co-design ideas for the next phase of this work across the network.

Cyber Security: What would you do?

Tuesday, 3.20pm, Legends Lounge, capacity 88

Cyber security is everyone’s responsibility – and the threats facing our network are constantly evolving. Join Pete Bradbury for a practical and interactive session exploring key cyber security risks facing Citizens Advice, brought to life through real-world examples. We’ll look at what these risks could mean in our different roles, test our thinking about how we would respond, and explore how we can strengthen our approach to keeping ourselves, our colleagues and the people we support safe. There’ll also be an opportunity to put your questions to Pete and share what’s on your mind in a Q&A – so bring your cyber security questions, concerns and scenarios.

Our future network-wide safeguarding strategy

Tuesday, 11.15am, Enterprise, capacity 32

This session will explore what safeguarding people means, share network-wide risks and identify key priorities participants would like help to understand more about.

Funds, referrals and the bit that is hardest to measure

Tuesday, 1.45pm, Enterprise, capacity 32

Getting support to people who need it is a job in itself. Eligibility to check, evidence to gather, payments to get out quickly and account for afterwards. Citizens Advice BCP will share how they have changed the way they do it with FundingConnect, and what they have learned along the way. We will then look at what comes next: getting someone to the right support after the initial help, tracking referrals and measuring outcomes. One journey, one platform, from the first application through to impact.

Public digital and self-serve: Exploring what’s possible

Tuesday, 11.15am, Discovery, capacity 32

What could it look like for clients to find the information they need and get support through more digital and self-serve options? In this practical, interactive session, Dina Bhadreshwara will share and demonstrate work exploring how digital tools could support the client journey on the Citizens Advice public website.

You’ll see some of the ideas and prototypes in action, including how we’re exploring ways to help people find the right information and navigate towards the support they need. We’ll also look at how algorithms can help us understand and improve the client journey.

But this session isn’t just about showing you what’s being developed. We want to hear from colleagues across the network about what you think, what would work in practice, and what we need to consider as we develop these approaches.

Citizens Advice and Trussell: Tackling Destitution Together

Tuesday, 1.45pm, Discovery, capacity 32

We’ll explore the Citizens Advice and Trussell Trust Partnership, which tested whether local partnerships between Citizens Advice and food banks could strengthen prevention and early intervention for people at risk of destitution. We’ll explore how well the project has met its key aims, and how it has helped build the evidence for a properly funded advice sector and for changes to the policies that push people into destitution.

Building a stronger work culture together

Tuesday, 3.20pm, Discovery, capacity 32

Shape the future of our workplace!  The newly established People and Culture workstream is launching at this year's conference, and the People and Culture team and network members of our mission leadership groups want to build this work alongside you. In this interactive workshop, we’ll gather your ideas to help define the work culture we should be working towards. Come along to learn where we’re headed, and add your voice to the foundation of this new workstream.: What do we want to achieve together, and how do we make the right choices about where we’re heading?

This interactive session will bring colleagues from across the network together to explore our collective direction and impact. Building on the work already underway through our missions, we’ll look at what we’re collectively trying to achieve, where we want to focus our energy and what this means for our goals and impact over the longer term.

Most importantly, this is an opportunity to shape what comes next together. We’ll explore how we can make the most of our collective strengths, how more of the network can contribute to making our missions successful, and what we need to do differently to create lasting impact for the communities we serve.

The future of adviser tools 

Tuesday, 11.15am, Endeavour, capacity 32

What could the next generation of adviser tools look like, and what will advisers need from them?

In this interactive tabletop discussion, Jennifer Dingley and Dan Barrett will lead a small-group exploration of the future of adviser technology and tools at Citizens Advice. Together, we’ll look at emerging ideas, understand what works well, consider what could make the biggest difference to volunteers, advisers, supervisors and service managers in practice, and explore the opportunities and challenges ahead.

This session is aimed at colleagues with a particular interest in how technology can support advice giving, and how it could evolve to better meet the needs of today and the future. The discussion will also help shape a session that will be rolled out more widely across the network in 2027.

Lunchtime Meet-up: The rural and coastal collective 

Tuesday, 12:30pm, Endeavour, capacity 32

Drop in over lunch to meet members of our rural and coastal collective. Bring your lunch and join the conversation about the unique challenges in rural and coastal locations. Get together and learn from one another.