Getting the right advice - with Comic Relief and Sainsbury's

Today we’re announcing ￡500,000 of new funding from Comic Relief and Sainsbury’s which will enable The Bread and Butter Thing to expand – both geographically and also in the range of services that we offers to our members.

Making food affordable and opening up access to better quality, nutritious food for low income families is just the start.

Here’s why…

For people like Shireen, one of our members and volunteers. Shireen is a single mum with two kids – both of them autistic. She’s their fulltime carer, using TBBT’s affordable food to help stretch her limited finances.

Shireen’s own business had to be iced during the pandemic when the caring needs for her children became too much to juggle and she now dedicates her days to them – and the small mountain of administration and appointments that comes with looking after a disabled family member. She has spent years navigating the labyrinth of benefits, health and education support that they need. She now shares the knowledge and skills that she has gained to help other parents in applying for PIP, Disability Living Allowance, Carers Allowance and so on. She’s a one-woman advice channel on TikTok. But she is not alone…

Accessing benefits, knowing what's available and what to apply for is a challenge for anyone on a low income. Whether that’s balancing low paid work with Universal Credit, applying for Warm Home grants or registering for Healthy Start Vouchers.

We’re already working with partners to bring expertise into our hubs to offer 1-2-1 support, advice and practical solutions. The new funding from Comic Relief and Sainsburys will allow us to deepen and extend this work – bringing in new partners across our hubs who are specialists in areas such as debt, energy, digital exclusion, and income maximisation, whether that's apply for benefits or employment support.

Together we want to be assisting our members to make their money and resources stretch further.

We've already got some really interesting projects on the go. For example, in Manchester, Citizens Advice are currently visiting all of our hubs with their mobile advice van and in Darlington, the Green Doctors are touring our hubs helping people find ways to cut down their energy usage, whether that's applying for cavity wall insulation or draught proofing windows.

Meanwhile in our Gorse Hill hub, Groundwork are running an intensive four week money management course looking at everything from benefit applications to budgeting to finding your best energy provider.

But it’s not just about the expertise – it’s the face to face interactions that help make all the difference.

Digital exclusion is a big issue for our members – compounded by so many services now moving their advice lines and information online. Only 38% of our members are confident online. 23% don’t even have access to proper broadband at home. So face to face interactions can be transformative, as individuals gain information and skills they struggle to access elsewhere. And visiting advisors can also look holistically at the whole picture to spot other areas where support might be beneficial.

The results are really tangible. For example, when Citizens Advice visited 23 of our hubs last year, they helped multiple people apply for their Warm Homes discount, registered almost 150 people on the Priority Services Register and identified energy efficiency ideas amounting to over ￡55,000 pounds when implemented. So it makes a really big difference to individuals.

But being able to get access to the right advice is where it all starts.

To hear more about Shireen’s story and how she makes TBBT a family affair, tune in to the latest episode of TBBT’s podcast, A Slice of Bread and Butter: It's a family affair with Shireen — The Bread and Butter Thing