CAB Support at Airdrie Foodbank (360G-SCVO-a0g0N00001gBVNgQAO)

Airdrie Foodbank operates three days per week at three different venues across the area. At present our partner agency, Citizens Advice Bureau Airdrie (CAB) are only able to provide their services at our foodbank session at Airdrie Baptist Church on Fridays. This has quickly become the busiest of our three sessions as clients know that, as well as collecting their food parcel and having a light lunch and chat with our friendly volunteers, CAB are also there to offer wider professional support and assist with applications such as the Warm Homes Allowance and benefits advice. The Community Capacity & Resilience Fund would allow us to expand our services and offer CAB support at our Monday foodbank session in the outlying village of Calderbank and at our Wednesday session at St Edwards Church, Airdrie. This will enable us to reach out to a greater number of clients than we currently do at present. There are no barriers to accessing our service and we have helped families, the elderly and young and those with physical and mental health issues. However, the one commonality is that all our clients are facing an immediate income crisis. This can be caused by a variety of factors such as redundancy, change in family circumstances and delays in benefit payments and therefore does not single out a specific social group. Our CAB advisor is qualified in benefits, debt, housing issues, consumer issues, immigration, and family and personal problems. He is also a qualified Energy Advisor and helps clients with fuel debt, switching, emergency credit for those in threat of going off supply and on going support for vulnerable clients. He is experienced in completing grant applications for clients that can clear thousands of pounds at a time for those unable to pay historic debt. He is also able to complete grant applications that can provide replacement boilers and heating systems for some clients with old heating systems that are unable to afford upgrades themselves. He also works as a debt administrator for the bureau, helping clients with debt issues and rent and mortgage arrears cases. This is particularly relevant as the roll out of Universal Credit in North Lanarkshire has seen a large increase in rent/mortgage arrears cases leaving more people in debt and requiring assistance from both food banks and Citizens Advice. His presence at the food bank will assist in identifying clients in this position and if court action has begun or is imminent CAB have an in-court service where representation can be provided and negotiation with debtors can be done by the debt adviser. If we were successful, we would also use the fund to purchase a laptop with internet access and a printer. This would allow CAB advisors and the foodbank volunteers to help our clients with a range of additional support, such as online applications and signposting to other agencies such as local health services.