CARE: supporting people with complex needs
CARE, Christian Action and Resource Enterprise, is a charity in Grimsby supporting people who are in crisis.
Charity location
Focus
Grant size
Anne Bickerstaffe, CEO of CARE, Christian Action and Resource Enterprise, spoke with us about how the Foundation’s support has helped the charity develop and grow in the midst of challenges.
At CARE, we work with people who are struggling with extreme poverty and a wide range of issues including domestic violence, gang intimidation, exploitation, and drug and alcohol use. Almost every person we work with also has mental health difficulties and/or physical illnesses or disabilities.
We run a crisis drop-in centre five days a week in Grimsby, where people can come in with any issues and ask for support, and we also provide intensive one-to-one support to people in the community. Alongside this, we have a housing programme for people who otherwise couldn’t get housed.
We partner with more than 40 local landlords; we put up the bond and help the people we work with to hold down their tenancies. A lot of landlords are socially conscious but feel ill equipped to help people who are who are vulnerable. We support landlords by organising essential paperwork and repairs, similar to an agency. We've been working with many of these landlords for a long time and they know that through CARE they will get a tenant who will be able to hold down their tenancy and treat the property well. So, it works both ways.
Building trust
Often when people come to us, other organisations and services have not been able to help, so people have been sent from one place to another until they arrive on our doorstep. People sometimes come in angry, upset, very distressed – because they feel like they've been turned away from everywhere. But it changes everything when we take the time to listen to their story and hear what’s been happening for them.
Without building trust and a relationship with someone, it's very difficult to help them rebuild their lives. And that's something that we do really well at CARE. Most of our staff have lived experience of crisis or homelessness and that really helps to build that relationship, that empathy, and to just keep walking alongside somebody no matter what.
In the last few years, the challenges people are facing have become more complex than ever, particularly following the pandemic and the cost of living crisis. We are working in one of the most deprived areas of the country and the levels of need can be extreme. It can be difficult to describe to people who don’t come from an area like this. So much funding that comes through statutory agencies is dedicated to helping people with just one issue. But this doesn't take into account that when people have got into real dire need, and are in crisis, there are so many overlapping issues that need to be addressed.
The Foundation has been absolutely brilliant. We’re in a much better place than two years ago when we first got the grant. The unrestricted funding alongside the development support really is life changing for charities and I'm so grateful.
- Anne Bickerstaffe, CEO, CARE
Right to left: Anne Bickerstaffe, CEO, CARE with Gary Beharrell, Regional Manager at Lloyds Bank Foundation, and a person supported by CARE
Support from the Foundation
The funding from the Foundation has made such a difference to our work. Unrestricted funding means that we are able to put that funding where it's most needed within the charity, whether that's for our core running costs or overall salary costs. It gets our staff out there on the front line.
What I've appreciated as much as the funding, is the support from Gary, our Regional Manager at the Foundation, who has been amazing. Being a CEO of a charity can be quite a lonely place and at times you just want somebody with an outside perspective to be able to share things with. And whenever there's been something that I feel we need to develop in, I’ve been able to go to Gary and ask him for advice and see if the Foundation can offer any support.
The development support that we've received from the Foundation has been really bespoke and it’s made such a difference to our growth. I genuinely don't think we'd be where we were today without the Foundation. Being under the Foundation’s umbrella, as it were, has felt like a safe place to be for the last two years as we've been going through a lot of transition. I have really appreciated that level of support and the different types of support that have been offered.
Our staff have taken up the one-to-one resilience coaching offered by the Foundation’s development consultants, and they've just been amazed by it. Our frontline staff are giving out to others, day in, day out, always thinking about other people's needs, but never having other people thinking about their needs. So, it’s been so valuable to be able to offer them this coaching, and they've said that it has been life changing.
The Foundation has also helped us connect with colleagues from Lloyds Banking Group. I attended a charity forum where I had two hours with Lloyds Bank employees to share some of the problems I was grappling with, and they offered advice. It was brilliant, and they suggested that getting an Operations Manager would solve some of the main challenges I was facing. That helped me go to the trustees and make the case for hiring an Operations Manager, which they agreed to, and we were able to employ someone shortly after. That in itself has had such an impact – our Operations Manager has taken so many things off my shoulders which has enabled me to focus on other things.
I was made homeless two days before lockdown. I found a property in Grimsby, but it was derelict, in very poor condition. There was no back door. The electrics were faulty.
My plan was to move here and then get a job, but I couldn't do that because of lockdown and then my mental health declined over a period of six months. The mental health team referred me to CARE once they discharged me. The next day my support worker from CARE turned up at my door with a big smile and said, “How can I help?” And one of the first things she wanted to do was to get me out of that property into suitable living arrangements.
They moved me to a flat which has a massive garden and it's on the ground floor. This has helped build up my mental and physical health. I’m thankful to CARE for helping me to get the suitable accommodation I needed to be able to start living my life again. I'm stable and I'm on medication now. I'm happy. I feel like I have a purpose. CARE has given me the confidence to find my self-worth again and realise that there's more to me than I realised in the past.
The one-to-one support workers are working tirelessly to support people like myself, and I think that they should be recognised for the work they've done in the community and the lives they’ve changed. Because they saved my life.
- James*, supported by CARE
CARE helped me out when I was in a situation where I had to find somewhere else to live pretty quickly. I didn't have the money for a deposit, but CARE said that they'd be able to sort that out, and they got me a flat.
It made me realise how unhappy I was before, because I'm so happy where I am now. I've been there just over a year, and I've never been happier. It's been brilliant. It's totally changed my life in every way.
My support worker from CARE comes round to see me every week. They'll help me with any anything that I'm needing help with, whether it be doctor's appointment or hospital appointments or benefits. If I'm struggling with bills, just absolutely anything. They are absolute angels.
I had no sight in my right eye and my support worker talked me into getting an eye test. It turned out that I had a severe cataract in my eye. CARE supported me with going to appointments and getting the operation I needed. Without their help, I wouldn't have done any of it myself for sure, I'd still be blind in my right eye, but with their help I've had it fixed and my sight is totally back.
CARE have helped me in so many different ways. They've been so good to me. I would just like to thank them for everything that they've done for me.
- Martin*, supported by CARE
Developing new income streams
Our biggest challenge at the moment is the revenue hole that we've got in our budget. I'm an experienced fundraiser and it feels harder than ever at the moment, and the rejections are coming. One of our big challenges is that when funders are oversubscribed, they tend to favour the charities that are very specific in what they do, and at times our work seems too broad. For example, we work with a lot of people who are victims of exploitation, but not everybody is. We work with a lot of women who have come out of violent relationships and need a safe home, but not all of people will work with are in this group, and so on. So, we don't quite fit, we can't be shoehorned into something specifically.
To plug the gap in funding, we need to focus on the work the Foundation has been supporting us with around our trading and developing new streams of income. Our new Operations Manager has been on a Trading and Sustainability course funded by the Foundation and worked closely with a development consultant from the Foundation which has been brilliant. Our charity shop is now bringing in 25% more profit than it did this time last year because of that support. We're now starting up a snow cone stall, and we have lots of other ideas that we are excited about. We're also about to start some consultancy from the Foundation around how we can raise money from local businesses and individuals which I think will be really helpful.
Our new building that we’ve just bought will also open up so many new opportunities for us. The location is perfect, and we’ll have the space to do so much more, like run group activities and workshops. We plan to build an extension so that we can rent out rooms to other organisations and this will really help us develop and grow our work in the next couple of years.
It's so much more than a building. It’s about being able to offer the people we support a safe space in the community, a second home. One of the things we hear is from the people we work with is how lonely they can be. Right now, we don't have anywhere for people to meet together, but our new building will enable us to provide that space and build community, which is really exciting.
*Names changed to protect identities.
Find out more about CARE by visiting their website: www.carenelincs.co.uk
