Maryvale Community Project
Charity 1147691
www.maryvalecommunityproject.org.uk
Overview
Summary
Maryvale Community Project appears to be a small, place-based social-infrastructure organisation: it combines a community centre, staff and volunteers to reduce isolation among older people and adults with learning disabilities in north Birmingham. Its practical activities are narrow but purposeful, while its charitable objects allow a broader community-development role. The project seems distinctive less for specialist provision alone than for converting parish-linked premises and support into a local, relational setting for friendship, routine and participation.
Operational geography
Evidence and reasoning
Supporting evidence
Oscott
Confidence: high
Direct evidence identifies Maryvale Community Centre as the location where the charity delivers its services. Birmingham City Council also identifies the centre within an Oscott polling district.
- Maryvale Community Project website
The organisation says it has provided community activities from Maryvale Community Centre, Birmingham for over 20 years, and lists the centre as its contact location. - Charity Commission charity overview, Maryvale Community Project (charity 1147691)
The Charity Commission records that services are delivered at Maryvale Community Centre, Birmingham. - Birmingham City Council, Notice of Poll and List of Polling Stations (2026)
The council lists Maryvale Community Project, Maryvale Community Centre, as polling station OSC5, placing the site within the Oscott electoral area.
Kingstanding
Confidence: high
The organisation explicitly identifies Kingstanding as one of the communities it supports, while its current annual-report material says it primarily serves residents of the Maryvale parish area, defined to include Kingstanding.
- Maryvale Community Project website
The website states that the project supports older people and adults with learning disabilities in Kingstanding, Great Barr and the Pheasey Estate, and says its services were developed in response to needs identified in those communities. - Maryvale Community Project trustees' report and financial statements for the year ended 31 October 2024, filed via the Charity Commission
The report says that the project seeks to serve residents primarily in the Parish of Maryvale, defined as the Kingstanding, Great Barr and Pheasey Estate areas of north-east Birmingham.
Remaining uncertainties
- The evidence clearly establishes a service base in Oscott and a beneficiary focus including Kingstanding, but it does not specify the number of Kingstanding residents served or whether any regular sessions take place away from Maryvale Community Centre.
- Great Barr and the Pheasey Estate are repeatedly named as part of the organisation's intended service community, but neither is available as a recognised place identifier in the supplied list. The evidence does not support assigning those references to particular supplied Birmingham wards.
- Home visiting and telephone befriending may extend activity beyond the centre, but the available evidence does not provide current service-user locations or delivery boundaries.
- Father Hudson's Caritas and Our Lady of the Assumption Parish are material operational partners: the former provides HR, recruitment, policy and line-management support, while the parish supports the community-centre base. The evidence does not show that either partnership extends Maryvale Community Project's direct service delivery into additional Birmingham wards.
Additional evidence needed
- A current service or referral-area map, or anonymised information on the broad areas where current participants live, to establish the practical reach of home visiting, telephone befriending and centre-based activities.
- Confirmation from the organisation of whether its current beneficiaries are restricted to, prioritised within, or drawn more widely than Kingstanding, Great Barr and the Pheasey Estate.
- Details of any current outreach venues, satellite sessions or formal delivery arrangements outside Maryvale Community Centre.
Areas of work
- Disability
- General Charitable Purposes
- Other Charitable Purposes
- Religious Activities
- The Prevention Or Relief Of Poverty
Who they help
- Children/young People
- Elderly/old People
- People With Disabilities
How they help
- Provides Advocacy/advice/information
- Provides Buildings/facilities/open Space
- Provides Services
Discoveries involving this organisation
The Atlas has not published any Discoveries involving this organisation yet.
Observations
A relationship-centred response to isolation
The available evidence suggests Maryvale’s core role is to create repeated social contact for people at risk of isolation, rather than simply deliver discrete welfare services.
Why it matters
This frames lunch clubs, befriending and activities as mutually reinforcing ways of building belonging. Its value may therefore depend on continuity, trusted relationships and regular attendance as much as on the number of services offered.
Show evidence
“Services include a weekly lunch club, telephone befriending service and Sunshine Club for adults with learning disabilities.”
Source:Organisation“The project provides opportunities to socialise, develop friendships and reduce isolation.”
Source:Organisation
A locally embedded partnership model
Maryvale appears to operate through an interdependent local ecosystem: parish premises and identity, external charity infrastructure, paid staff and volunteers are combined rather than held within one organisation alone.
Why it matters
This helps explain both its resilience and possible dependencies. The project may be able to sustain a local presence because it draws on relationships and shared infrastructure that a standalone provider could struggle to maintain.
Show evidence
“The parish prepared and refurbished Maryvale Community Centre to serve the wider community.”
Source:Organisation“Father Hudson's Caritas provides help with HR, recruitment, policies, procedures and line management.”
Source:Organisation“Maryvale employs its own staff with support from a volunteer team and volunteer Board of Directors.”
Source:Organisation
Broad civic remit, focused delivery
There is a notable tension between Maryvale’s wide charitable objects, including community capacity building and support for the voluntary sector, and its publicly described delivery focus on older people and adults with learning disabilities.
Why it matters
This may indicate unrealised flexibility: Maryvale could be a platform for wider neighbourhood development, not only a service provider. Alternatively, the broad objects may simply provide legal latitude. Understanding which is true would clarify its future potential.
Show evidence
“The objects include promoting citizenship, volunteering, the voluntary sector, community capacity building and urban and rural regeneration.”
Source:Charity Commission“The project was designed around support for elderly people living alone and adults with learning disabilities.”
Source:Organisation
- Whether the project reaches people beyond its current clubs and befriending participants.
- How dependent its finances, premises and management capacity are on parish and Father Hudson's Caritas support.
- Whether its wider community-development objects shape current strategy or are mainly enabling provisions.
Remaining uncertainties
- Recent annual reports, accounts and service outcome data, including participant numbers, repeat attendance and waiting lists.
- Evidence of local partnerships, referral routes and community consultation.
- Information on governance, funding sources and the terms of its use of Maryvale Community Centre.
Additional evidence needed
Charity Commission profile
Activities
The Charity provides lunch clubs and activities for the elderly and adults with disabilities. It provides a telephone befriending service for the housebound and lonely. Its overall aim is to nurture social cohesion and community building regardless of religious affiliation or social status. Services are delivered at Maryvale Community Centre, Old Oscott Hill, Birmingham B44 9SR.
Charity objects
(1)TO FURTHER SUCH CHARITABLE PURPOSES FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE COMMUNITY IN THE AREA OF BENEFIT AS THE TRUSTEES SEE FIT FROM TIME TO TIME IN PARTICULAR THOSE THAT FALL WITHIN THE DESCRIPTION OF CHARITABLE PURPOSES (SET OUT IN S. 3(1)(E) OF THE CHARITIES ACT 2011) BEING THE ADVANCEMENT OF CITIZENSHIP OR COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT – CHARITABLE PURPOSES THAT FALL WITHIN THIS DESCRIPTION BEING: •THE PROMOTION OF GOOD CITIZENSHIP AND CIVIC RESPONSIBILITY; •THE PROMOTION OF URBAN AND RURAL REGENERATION; •THE PROMOTION OF VOLUNTEERING FOR THE PUBLIC BENEFIT WHERE TO DO SO FURTHERS CHARITABLE PURPOSES FALLING WITHIN THE DESCRIPTIONS OF PURPOSES SET OUT IN S. 3 OF THE CHARITIES ACT 2011; •THE PROMOTION OF THE VOLUNTARY SECTOR FOR THE PUBLIC BENEFIT; •PROMOTING THE EFFICIENCY AND EFFECTIVENESS OF CHARITIES AND THE EFFECTIVE USE OF CHARITABLE RESOURCES; •THE PROMOTION OF COMMUNITY CAPACITY BUILDING; AND BY •PROMOTING OR ADVANCING EXCLUSIVELY CHARITABLE PURPOSES OF CHARITIES CONCERNED WITH SOCIAL INVESTMENT. "THE VOLUNTARY SECTOR" MEANS CHARITIES AND VOLUNTARY ORGANISATIONS. (A)CHARITIES ARE ORGANISATIONS, WHICH ARE ESTABLISHED FOR EXCLUSIVELY CHARITABLE PURPOSES IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAW OF ENGLAND AND WALES. (B)VOLUNTARY ORGANISATIONS ARE TYPES OF INDEPENDENT ORGANISATIONS, WHICH ARE ESTABLISHED FOR PURPOSES THAT ADD VALUE TO THE COMMUNITY AS A WHOLE, OR A SIGNIFICANT SECTION OF THE COMMUNITY, AND WHICH ARE NOT PERMITTED BY THEIR CONSTITUTION TO MAKE A PROFIT FOR PRIVATE DISTRIBUTION. VOLUNTARY ORGANISATIONS DO NOT INCLUDE LOCAL GOVERNMENT OR OTHER STATUTORY AUTHORITIES. (2)THE RELIEF OF THOSE IN NEED BY REASON OF YOUTH, OLD AGE, ILL-HEALTH, DISABILITY, FINANCIAL HARDSHIP OR OTHER DISADVANTAGE; IN EVERY CASE WITHIN THE KINGSTANDING, GREAT BARR AND PHEASEY ESTATE AREAS OF NORTH BIRMINGHAM (THE AREA OF BENEFIT) AND IN CARRYING OUT THESE OBJECTS THE CHARITY SHALL REMAIN INSPIRED AND GUIDED BY THE ETHOS AND VALUES OF ITS MISSION STATEMENT.