This community of practice (CoP) was hosted and filmed on the 14th of March 2024. It was organised to meet the demand from many Food Summit (21st September 2023) participants to learn more about models of wrap around support, advice, guidance and additional opportunities for individuals that present at community food provisions.
Background
Adele Wilson-Hope provided the context for this CoP by referring to the different ‘more than food’ models discovered across York and North Yorkshire as part of this ongoing Project:
Description
This CoP explored two different ‘more than food’ models that had the common thread of seeking to help individuals connect to their benefits entitlements and / or accessing support linked to their financial situation – though different forms of support and help are also described in the film.
In the recording you will hear firstly from Charlotte Wild and Jack McKenzie from the Foodbank Project Team that forms part of North Yorkshire Citizens Advice & Law Centre.
Charlotte provides a context for the demand for their service since 2018, the volume of clients they support, the range of requests they respond to though their advice line and specialists. In summary Charlotte provided statistics and insights that confirmed they had
“….seen an increase in demand over the past 5 years and all our teams feel busy; but that it’s very difficult to predict demand.”
She then describes the Foodbank Project which sees qualified Advisors situated within community food provisions including foodbanks in Starbeck (Harrogate) and Knaresborough, Selby and most recently since January 2024, in Skipton.
You’ll hear in the film about how the model works and from Jack, one of the qualified advisors, what this looks like and feels like in practice – from ‘exploration’ conversations with people to providing helpful and practical advice:
“We try and understand why people are there and what events have led up to them needing to use a food bank. And what things to put in place to increase income or make life a bit easier. What do we help with? We try to help with anything, otherwise we signpost.”
And when asked how does Jack build up trust with people in the foodbank?
“Being human, not being robotic, or putting red tape in the way. We get a feel for how they are. Foodbanks have a lot of stigma already so talking about their finances to a stranger (advisor) in a place that, despite being confidential, can still be noisy we need to offer things that work for them like ‘do you want to back to the office’ or ‘would you like me to call you later?’ show that you’re on their side. It can be multiple meetings to get rapport, but it helps that I’m there all the time – a consistent face that they can get to know. That helps a lot.”
You’ll also hear about the kind of results being achieved through this model too. In 2023, for example, across the Foodbank Project they had helped 675 people with 926 issues amounting to £1,585,105 worth of annual financial gains for clients. The main issue has been ‘benefits’ followed by ‘debt’ in 2023.
Next you’ll hear from Susan Wood, Welfare Benefits and Strategic Partnership Manager at City of York Council, and how she has been working with The Collective Sharehouse to shape and soon trial a way of training volunteers up at their community food provision to become ‘Money Guiders.’ This will see them providing guidance to individuals that come to their venue with greater confidence stressing that the approach is NOT advice.
“We’re very clear this is not an advisor role. We’re clear about the boundaries of the role. It’s not advice it’s about guidance, signposting and awareness raising and helping people know where they can get more support and guiding them through that.”
This development was born out of a reality that York doesn’t have enough advice resources to provide an adviser – paid or otherwise in every (food) setting so alternatives were required.
The Collective Sharehouse asked:
“How can we do more ourselves?”
You’ll see from Susan’s presentation some of the topics covered in the induction pack for volunteers and the journey that they are about to go on with some willing volunteers to see how this works in practice.
“We’re training volunteers to ask simple questions so they can signpost and refer on to those specific agencies that can help with more support. It’s about these Volunteers having tools resources and confidence to have those conversations with people about why they’re coming in and hopefully getting that extra financial support and signposting to that further advice if they need it.”
It’s still early days but Susan comments:
“As we’ve learned together when bringing volunteers into this role there needs to be a coordinator for them to train them so we’ve produced an induction ‘flier’ so when people (volunteers) show an interest in the Money Guiders role some information can be supplied about what’s expected and involved. If they say, ‘yes’ to that we’re putting together an induction training and support package that will support them into that role and the resources the service needs to do that.”
What next?
CoP participants from around York and North Yorkshire showed immediate interest in these approaches, particularly other VCSEs and community food provisions who felt they might be able to develop something along similar lines.
“It sounds really interesting, and I’d like to have a go in our provision with the money guidance. We think people are coming in for tea and a chat, but we want to unearth why they’re there as the money issues are there too. Definitely interested in trying something like this.” (CoP participant in North Yorkshire)
The film and presentation slides found on this page can help others looking to know more about each approach and make connections.
Working together to get ‘more than food’ models across York and north Yorkshire
There was also some discussion about if, and how to work together, ‘at scale’ such as developing a collective bid to someone like The National Lottery where we could perhaps see support for ‘more than food’ approaches in York and north Yorkshire – importantly building on the good practice and provisions already in place, whilst also targeting areas where there were gaps in ‘more than food models’.
There were some great ideas shared already on the CoP and we’d like to build on these with your help please.
If you would like to get involved in a conversation about the opportunity to shape a collective bid or simply identify good practice and gaps in ‘more than food’ models in York and North Yorkshire please contact Adele.Wilson-Hope@northyorks.gov.uk and alan@skyblue.org.uk who would be happy to put some energy into facilitating this kind of collaboration should the appetite be there amongst CoP participants.