Salisbury charity joins calls for improved Household Support Fund
The scheme has been extended - but the Trussell Trust says that's not enough
A Salisbury-based charity has joined calls for a longer-term strategy to provide support for people on lower incomes.
The Trussell Trust has welcomed the extension of the Household Support Fund to next April, and will help struggling families meet energy, food and water costs - but both they say it's not enough.
Both the charity and Wiltshire Council are asking the Government to create a more sustainable funding support programme.
Since being introduced in 2021, it's allowed 90 schemes in Wiltshire to be set up to help families, disabled people and older adults.
The Trussell Trust's Head of Policy and Research, Sumi Rabindrakumar, told Greatest Hits Radio that they're pleased the Government has listened to frontline organisations, saying this support makes a big difference.
She said: "This is the kind of support that makes a real difference and means that you don't have to take out loans or incur debt when you face those costs.
"Instead, you're able to meet those costs, and often it means that that short term one off crisis doesn't turn into long term hardship."
An opportunity to change
But there's a need for a more permanent solution.
Ms Rabindrakumar said: "We've seen sort of temporary extension after temporary extension and what that means is that local councils they can't plan in advance to for how they provide that support."
The charity says the latest extension is an opportunity to come up with a strategy that provides support for the long-term, something Ms Rabindrakumar says has long been missed in England.
She said: "At the moment it's a real patchwork of support out there in terms of who can get prices for and who can't.
"We think we can use this latest extension to really commit to a new long term vision accompanied by funding for local crisis support so that people can see a point where food banks are a last resort and ideally we can end the need for food banks."
She added that there are 'positive noises' from the Government about how to tackle hardship and potential reforms to universal credit.
"We know that there's a manifesto commitment to end the need for emergency food parcels and we think that effective long term crisis support should be part of that solution to ending the need for emergency food," she said.
Wiltshire Council Leader Richard Clewer said there needs to be a commitment to 'sustainable and systemic changes'.
He said: "As a council we want to express the need for a longer-term flexible and programme to continue to meet this need. Since it was introduced fuel, rents and food prices have risen at a much higher rate than has previously been seen.
"We need timely and long-term funding support alongside a commitment to a more sustainable and systemic changes to help us move forward for the better.
"This will ensure we can continue with our preventative approach to supporting people, by always looking at the bigger picture and not just short-term fixes.”