News / Lottery fund saves money advice service
THE BIG Lottery Fund is stepping in to save Shetland’s money advice service run by the Citizens Advice Bureau after the council cut its funding.
On Tuesday Shetland CAB was awarded more than £280,000 for a project involving the local credit union and NHS Shetland to help tackle the damaging effects of government welfare reform.
Some of the money will be used to help vulnerable people open a bank account and access affordable credit through the Shetland Credit Union.
CAB will also run an outreach service four days a week at Lerwick health centre to try and mitigate some of the harmful effects money worries can have on people’s health.
Local CAB manager Sylvia Jamieson said the funding until March 2015 would create one new full time job, upgrade one part time administration post to full time, and retain the organisation’s two money advisers.
The cash comes from the lottery’s new Support and Connect Fund, which has just released £9 million to 59 projects in Scotland to relieve hardship.
The Lerwick CAB team had to apply for outside funding after Shetland Islands Council decided to withdraw funding for its two money advisers in March.
Jamieson persuaded the SIC to extend the funding until the end of September giving CAB time to find alternative income.
“If we had lost that to Shetland it would have been a fairly serious matter as there would have been nowhere to turn for complex debt advice,” she said.
Financial problems have escalated in the isles, with a massive increase in payday loans being used for basic living needs such as food, fuel and heating.
NHS Shetland has identified that such money worries lead to health problems, inspiring CAB’s new one stop shop at the Lerwick health centre.
“A lot of the most vulnerable clients find it really difficult to go to a new agency, but if we are in an environment they are already attending and feeling fairly comfortable with, it might be easier for them to come to us,” Jamieson said.
She said that people losing their jobs or having their hours cut were turning up on their doorstep more often, at the same time as they were having their funding cut.
“There is a double whammy in that these organisations are being supported less at a time when they are needed most.
“So there is a wider question about the local authority’s commitment towards the most vulnerable in this community.”
Meanwhile CAB’s funding from the Shetland Charitable Trust has been frozen for several years, resulting in a real term cut.
The local Citizen Advice Bureau can be contacted on 01595 69 4696 or via e-mail at sicab@shetland.org
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