Hall Green Families has worked closely with local schools and community organisations to apply for over 4000 Household Support Fund grants for those most in need this winter.
The Department of Work and Pensions allocated Household Support Funds to Birmingham to help those facing financial hardship through the winter. Through a partnership between Birmingham City Council, BVSC, Early Help locality leads such as Hall Green Families and a network of trusted partners, thousands of hardship grants of up to £150 have been made between 21st December and 2nd March. These funds have supported households in the most need with food, energy and water bills and wider essential costs.
Schools across the locality have worked tirelessly to help access funds for their families. This builds on already strongly established links with many schools through active monthly communications, Early Help training, multi-agency case work to help vulnerable families, and requests for support through Family Connect Forms. Schools are vital early help informed community assets. As a result of the Household Support Fund we have worked closer than ever!
Through December the Hall Green Families Team ran support surgeries in schools for families identified by schools as facing financial hardship. As a result almost 400 HSF applications were made during December as part of the grant pilot!
During January and February, 284 professionals, mostly those from educational settings across the city, were briefed on how to become Trusted Partners for the grant. Ark St Albans Academy offers an exemplar of how these briefings helped support further early help relationships.
In January, Ark St Albans Academy attended one of our Household Support Fund Information Briefings to learn about the HSF fund, application rules and processes, and importantly, how it can help their pupil’s families this Winter.
The Safeguarding and Pastoral teams then worked together to set up an event at school, giving them the chance to meet with the families face to face to discuss their needs and apply for the fund. In addition to this, Ark St Albans used ‘From Birmingham, With Love’ information, printed in multiple languages, that families could take away and refer to should they need further support. In February the school met with 100 of their families and gave us feedback on how it went:
“The Household Support Fund Event was a brilliant way to catch up with so many of our families and provide this much needed support to our community. Our families were so grateful, and it was lovely to have this face to face catch up which allowed us to identify where additional support may be beneficial in a lot of cases. The “From Birmingham with Love” resources were graciously received, and this provided us with an opportunity to discuss what support was available in Birmingham and directly highlight this to our families. The support which we have received from Hall Green Families team has been fantastic and we would recommend any family in need to get involved with their locality hub and access the Early Help offer which is available.”
Erin McGuiness – Pastoral Care Coordinator | DDSL at Ark St Albans Academy
We would like to thank Ark St Albans Academy, and every school across the Hall Green Locality that has worked alongside us to offer support to their families through the Household Support Fund!