How often do we hear people saying they turn off the news? The terrors and images of war shake us up, but we can turn away, or tune out. Not so, for those caught up in it. Politicians may talk about security initiatives and improving our relations with Europe, just as Trump condemns our forces. Meanwhile, quietly and often unseen, people are doing their bit to try and help by fostering partnerships and trying to provide some practical assistance, from medical help to rebuilding critical infrastructure and more.
Take Ukraine, for example.
Sheffield’s Children’s Hospital has a world-leading sleep centre. In 2025, its staff supported colleagues from Ukraine’s Khmelnytskyi City Children’s Hospital to set up a new Sleep Studies centre, making it the only one in Ukraine outside Kyiv.
Two clinicians from Khmelnytskyi came to Sheffield as part of a World Bank-funded programme to bring paediatric clinicians to England for training in treating trauma, rehabilitation and other children’s health issues caused by war. This followed on from a formal agreement signed in 2022 establishing a twinning relationship between the two cities. This Memorandum of Understanding is reviewed annually and in March 2025 Sheffield councillors visited Lviv.
Strengthening Yorkshire-Ukraine bonds
Other cities, in Yorkshire and beyond, have also been forging links with counterparts in Ukraine. Only six percent of houses in Hull escaped bomb damage and 50% of the population of Hull were homeless at some point during the Blitz [subscription needed]. The coping mechanisms of Hull residents recalling the Blitz have been honed to help those currently devasted by war in Mariupol, Ukraine.
Barnsley has been twinned with Horlivka since the Cold War. In May 1956 a group of Yorkshire miners stayed there briefly during their study tour of the Soviet Union. In 1998 cosmonaut Alexander Volkov took Barnsley Chronicle character Sam Barn into space as the mascot for the Mir Space station.
Barnsley is one of over 30,000 town-twinning links between people from different walks of life across Europe. These extend across Yorkshire and include Leeds and York.
People-to-people support
While there is currently no formal guidance or funding available for UK-Ukraine local partnership activities, there is some for businesses helping to rebuild Ukraine, for critical infrastructure, skills and backing the UK-Ukraine Tech Bridge. The British Council has run a UK-Ukraine school twinning programme in 2025 focused on reading for pleasure and boosting awareness of each other’s cultures. Schools can download a free culture pack and sign up to participate in the programme. There are also schemes for library twinning, and over 33 UK-Ukraine university partnerships.
In addition, the Local Government Association can direct queries to the match-making platform of the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR). It supports councils in delivering the ‘Homes for Ukraine’ scheme, and follows the activities of the European Alliance of cities and Regions for the Reconstruction of Ukraine. These are all boosted by funding from the EU, the EU’s Committee of the Regions’ support packages, and capacity-building support.
Meanwhile, the august European Local Links working group of the European Movement, UK, continues its work, collating information, inspiring and promoting such partnerships both with Ukraine and other European local communities.
We are part of a wider community of partnerships in Europe
Elsewhere in Europe, over 80 municipalities from Sweden, Germany, Poland and France have begun long-term cooperation with their Ukrainian counterparts, backed by the Cities4cities initiative. Only last month, 34 Nordic municipalities participated in the Nordic-Ukrainian Municipal Partnership Forum which brought together representatives from Sweden, Finland and Norway, all sharing tested practices to build resilience and act effectively with limited resources in wartime.
This led to four new partnerships being established. The Sunne (Sweden)-Korsun-Shevchenkivskyi (Cherkasy Oblast) partnership focuses on crisis preparedness, waste management, and developing solar energy. That between Tjörn in Sweden and Novovorontsovka (Kherson Oblast) prioritises support for children and youth; and Norway’s Lier with Pavlohrad (Dnipropetrovsk Oblast) focuses on wider collaboration in education, culture, sport, tourism, self-government and environmental protection.
Youth partnership, rehabilitation and civil and food security including the provision of modern rehabilitation equipment for Ukraine’s Yampil Hromada hospital are the focus of the Yampil (Vinnytsia Oblast)-Vanersborg partnership with Sweden.
Youth and a shared vision of the future?
Governments across Europe are building up their mutual, reciprocal military support and defence capabilities, considering conscription (where it is not already mandatory) and working more effectively together. This includes us in the UK.
But military ties are not the only ones tying us to the continent. Young people in Britain share the same concerns about their future and current economic insecurities as their counterparts: in particular, housing, climate change, renewables, gender equality, health, democracy and employment. And everywhere there is a shared sense of democratic values and trust in government being eroded.
But there is hope and resilience. Local grassroots initiatives, led and inspired by young people learning from each other, within and across their own countries, continue to grow and draw inspiration from existing partnerships, and those yet to be developed. The UK government’s decision to join Erasmus+ to facilitate links between all young people from different communities here to engage with their peers in Europe underlines that.
Britain has played a major role in innovating and sustaining partnerships for young people for decades. Based not only on what has already been started with Ukraine, perhaps this is an area where Yorkshire can take a lead?
