Money set aside by our board and from Wiltshire Council’s Discretionary Support Fund meant 348 households received 566 grants to help with the cost of living.
The grants helped residents with rent payments, shopping vouchers, energy saving bulbs, food vouchers, utility bills, household items school uniforms and multiple other needs
The board earmarked £10,000 and an application to the council brought in £30,000, allowing the White Horse operations team to support many residents struggling with household bills over the last financial year, said Operations Director Belinda Eastland.
“Due to the high level of funding available, our Housing Officers were able to target most of our tenants in some way throughout the year,” she said. “Eligible households were invited to apply for food vouchers, school uniforms, help with utility bills and other wider essential items to assist them.”
The fund helped 146 households with children, 96 pensioners and 14 households containing disabled people, additionally staff were able to help 92 other households who were struggling but did not fit in to one of the above categories. “In total 348 households – that’s 75 per cent of all White Horse Housing’s households – received some form of assistance from the fund,” said Belinda.
Applications came from across all four local authority areas where White Horse has homes but, because the money from Wiltshire can only be spent in the county, there is an imbalance of where grants went. While 67 went to Somerset, 43 to Swindon and 12 to BANES, there were 444 awards made in Wiltshire.
Belinda said the fund has given staff a clearer picture of who the most vulnerable households are and why.
“This year we tried to assist with building resilience for the future as well as crises support. As a result 50 households received energy saving light bulbs from the scheme to help with ongoing electricity costs,” said Belinda. “During the summer heatwave we supplied a vertical compact fan to 40 pensioner households who were struggling with the heat.
“We’re extremely grateful to the help we received from Wiltshire Council, and also our board, in recognition of the ongoing high costs of food, fuel, utility bills and wider essentials.”