Transformation Cornwall, the Independent Food Aid Network (IFAN), Trussell, and Cornwall Council have been working together to promote a cash first or income-focused approach to food insecurity and poverty since 2021. Raising incomes as much as possible while preventing the need for food banks is at the heart of this response to financial hardship. And it’s clearer than ever that local partnership-working is key to embedding the provision of advice and/or any local available cash grants as first ports of call for people facing money worries and financial crises.
Together with other local agencies including Citizens Advice Cornwall, the group first co-published the Cornwall ‘Worrying About Money?’ leaflet in July 2021. An interactive version of the leaflet has since been developed, alongside a poster and, more recently, an easy read version. The resources have made their way into GP surgeries, schools, libraries, advice services, food banks, churches, community hubs, and town halls. Cornwall Council has embedded the interactive version on its website and supported the printing of over 50,000 leaflets distributed across Cornwall since the summer of 2021.
The step-by-step guides have helped people struggling with money worries as well as support workers and volunteers to navigate their way towards local cash first or income-focused support and advice. Having identified the type of financial concern that’s being faced, anyone using the leaflet can then find options to resolve that problem and the local agencies best able to provide support to ensure these options become real solutions.
Alongside the dissemination of the Cornwall ‘Worrying About Money?’ resources, our partnership has co-delivered Money Counts training sessions linked to the Cornwall ‘Worrying About Money?’ leaflet alongside Citizens Advice Cornwall and other frontline agencies. So far, we’ve run numerous training sessions for hundreds of frontline workers and volunteers.
Our collaborative work to co-produce the ‘Worrying About Money?’ resources and deliver Money Counts training represents a shared aim to build and sustain a supportive system within which anyone in Cornwall can access the support they need while reducing the need for charitable food aid. Our vision is a Cornwall where everyone can access effective cash first advice and support so that we can collectively reduce the demand for charitable food aid.
We’ve also worked together to facilitate critical conversations to collaborate more broadly and effectively. Once such facilitation enabled representatives from frontline organisations to feed into a review of Cornwall Council’s Discretionary Financial Assistance Policy leading to changes in the way people could apply for support outlined in our joint blog published in June 2023.
A year ago, in January 2024, we ran an in-person event in Truro focused on improving people’s access to support in Cornwall when faced with financial difficulties. This followed a similar event, again in Truro, in the summer of 2023 after which we jointly published this report: Finding ways to improve availability and access to financial support in Cornwall.
Clear themes emerged within the discussions at both events on the need to:
raise awareness of Cornwall Council’s Crisis and Care Awards scheme and how support can be accessed
establish how the Household Support Fund works and can be accessed in Cornwall
help people facing financial hardship find effective support from a range of organisations while ensuring any income is maximised
Partners across Cornwall are clear that investing in advice services, increasing the number of trained advisors particularly in areas where support is missing, and providing triage training for frontline support staff and volunteers (like the basic Money Counts training sessions described above) must be a key priority. Locating advice services in individual landscapes ahead of the point where someone needs to access support from a food bank is critical while maximising existing community hub spaces as points of access to advice and support.
At the start of this new year, we’re more determined than ever to push forward changes that are achievable at a local level. Food insecurity and poverty continue to plague Cornwall as well as the rest of the UK. This winter is hitting households in Cornwall hard with winter fuel payments coming to an end and the second increase in Ofgem’s price cap. The UK Government is working on a child poverty strategy set to be published in March while the Labour manifesto commitments on ending the mass dependance on emergency food parcels, reviewing Universal Credit, and the enactment of section 1 of the Equality Act could bring us hope. However, while we still wait for systemic change, continuing to build local momentum on a cash first approach to food insecurity is more important than ever.
We know now that the Household Support Fund has been extended until March 2026 which provides an unprecedented level of certainty about this funding pot.[1] Additionally, Cornwall is one of a small number of local authorities in England that has an existing discretionary support scheme in place. What’s more this scheme provides grants via cash payments. We will continue to work to ensure people facing financial hardship in Cornwall can find available support as easily as possible and access this help with as little delay as possible.
We are determined to ensure local advice services are accessible and working with Citizens Advice Cornwall and others to call for increased investment in this vital support. Transformation Cornwall is starting targeted work to promote the ‘Worrying About Money?’ resources in areas of highest deprivation through month-by-month events. Alongside this grassroots work, we’re hoping to commission an evaluation of these tools along the lines of ScotCen’s recent evaluation of the ‘Worrying About Money?’ guide in Scotland.
Collaboration is critical to pushing forward change and we hope that frontline organisations wherever they are in Cornwall will join our discussions and participate as much as they’re able to on actions to help more and more people facing financial hardship find as much cash first support as possible easily and transparently.
If you want to find out more or get involved please contact us via admin@foodaidnetwork.org.uk.
Further reading:
A review of Cornwall Council’s Local Welfare Assistance Scheme by frontline organisations supporting people experiencing financial hardship November 2021, Transformation Cornwall, IFAN, Trussell
Under one roof: Finding ways to improve availability and access to financial support in Cornwall June 2023
How the ‘Worrying About Money?’ guide is helping people facing financial insecurity Jo Wildman ScotCen
Taking a cash first approach to food insecurity: Resources linked to income-focused interventions IFAN Why Cash First?
Building ‘cash first’ momentum while breaking the food bank paradox from the ground up February 2024, Sabine Goodwin and Maria Marshall for CPAG
How do we keep hope alive in 2025 when so many people are going hungry? January 2025 Sabine Goodwin IFAN for the Big Issue
[1] IFAN and Trussell, alongside many other anti-poverty charities, are calling for permanent crisis support funding beyond next Spring’s deadline.