“The Office of National Statistics recently reported that almost 700,000 people found themselves out of work between March and July due to Covid-19. By the end of July unemployment rose to more than 4%. With the furlough scheme expiring at the end of this month, (October 31st) it's inevitable that unemployment will increase again. We cannot hide from the bleak winter ahead. So, with this in mind, is this Authority confident there is sufficient welfare support in place for its residents, and that this support is readily available? “
Minutes:
“The Office of National Statistics recently reported that almost 700,000 people found themselves out of work between March and July due to Covid-19. By the end of July unemployment rose to more than 4%. With the furlough scheme expiring at the end of this month, (October 31st) it's inevitable that unemployment will increase again. We cannot hide from the bleak winter ahead. So, with this in mind, is this Authority confident there is sufficient welfare support in place for its residents, and that this support is readily available?”
Response by Councillor Emlyn Dole, Leader of the Council:-
Can I first of all thank Councillor Lenny for his question, which I welcome at this critical time. It is absolutely on point with what we have been doing, as well as what we intend to do, in terms of our recovery programme in relation to Covid 19. That recovery programme responds to the stark reality of the impact that Covid 19 has had, and continues to have, on our economy and communities and the issues our people in Carmarthenshire will now be facing as a result. We are currently preparing a Tackling Poverty plan. Much of that will of course be around welfare support. As well as being a needs analysis it will be an action plan – what can we do to improve the situation our people are facing as well as what steps we need to take so that we can make progress and play our part in dealing with the real problems that will be facing so many people.
You will know that one of my first decisions as Leader was to overturn the decision by my predecessor to return the temporary front desk in Llanelli Town centre to Ty Elwyn. I decided that it should stay in the Town Centre and the Hwb was established in Vaughan street providing advice and assistance to residents on a multitude of our Council services, including a cash desk, housing support, employment engagement programmes and IT facilitates to support people looking for employment, education, apprenticeships and volunteering opportunities. Hundreds of people come through the doors every week helping to drive town centre footfall. A Similar Hwb facility has since been established in Ammanford town centre and our Spilman Street offices in Carmarthen.
There are several employability support schemes being delivered in Carmarthenshire, some of which are delivered by Carmarthenshire County Council, with others being coordinated by Careers Wales under the Working Wales gateway. Two of the schemes that we are delivering are Workways Plus and Communities for Work.
Workways + aims to increase the employability of Economically Inactive and Long Term/Short Term Unemployed people aged 25 and over, who have complex barriers to employment. Workways+ Team cover the whole of Carmarthenshire and are based within the HWB’s in Carmarthen, Llanelli and Ammanford. Each participant will be supported through a personalised mentoring provision, and support through Employer Liaison Officers to provide employment opportunities aligned to labour market trends.
Communities for Workfocuses on our most deprived communities, and provides 1-to-1 support, guidance, and training. The programme is able to offer community-based support, training barriers funding to help people into training or employment and works alongside key partner organisations. The team work on an outreach basis across Communities, with bases at the Llanelli and Ammanford Hwbs.
Communities for Work Plus provides specialist employment advisory support and intensive mentoring to people who are either in or at risk of poverty who are not eligible for Communities for Work, PaCE or other regional programmes funded by the European Social Fund, and who have complex barriers to employment and training opportunities.
Creating opportunities that will upskill individuals through basic skills and vocational training support, work tasters, placements, and support to achieve sustainable training and jobs.
The Council is also looking to participate in the Kickstart Work Placement Programme - As part of the government’s plan to increase job opportunities for young people, the new £2 billion Kickstart Scheme has been created to support hundreds of thousands of new, fully subsidised work placements for young people across the country.
The 6-month placements are open to those aged 16-24 who are claiming Universal Credit and are at risk of long-term unemployment. These will be available across a range of different sectors in England, Scotland and Wales. The first placements are likely to be available from November. Organisations and businesses sign up for this programme will need to commit a minimum of 30 new job placements. There are not many businesses of sufficient scale in Carmarthenshire able to commit to that. The Council is therefore looking to support businesses who have fewer than 30 jobs on offer by acting as an intermediary to facilitate the required minimum 30 job placements across a number of businesses and also as an employer so that the Council can also offer direct placements. Initial engagement with local businesses has identified that there is a positive appetite for that scheme. From those contacted to date, 58 companies have stated that they could accommodate a total of 110 placements, with further engagement and marketing it is envisaged that this number will only increase.
The council provides funding support to a number of partner agencies such as Care and Repair, offering repair and adaptations and also benefit maximisation checks and refer residents on to partner agencies who would support them as they apply for unclaimed benefits.
We also fund Shelter Cymru who offer debt and benefit advice across tenure for difficult complex cases. Anyone can self-refer or referrals can be made by organisations who identify debt or welfare benefit issues that are more complex than they can deal with or that they can address. You may already be aware that they sit within our Housing Team in Eastgate as do the Wallich and Care and Repair.
I could name others funded by us such as CAB, who provide entitlement assessments, applications for benefit preparation, appeals and tribunals.
Floating support, commissioned through supporting people offer advice and assistance on Tenancy Support, Welfare and Benefit Maximisation and Budgeting the same would be the case for all support providers such as the Wallich, Pobl - also based in Eastgate with our team, NACRO, CTAP, Offender Service and Domestic Abuse Services. All of that being the fundamental purpose of the grant.
Age Cymru Dyfed - Provides life-enhancing services and vital support to people in later life, which includes Health and Wellbeing as well as Warm Home and Benefit Maximisation services.
Catch-up - Provides a specialist welfare benefits information and advice service for individuals and their carers living in Carmarthenshire. Assistance can be given with form filling, reviews and appeals for most benefits. There is an office in Llanelli and Carmarthen. Whilst Age Cymru and Catch-up are not funded by the Council, officers work closely with them, making referrals to ensure the best outcome for our residents.
The Council’s Options and Advice team have a co-ordinating role in terms of ensuring clients in difficulties get welfare benefits advice and support.
Many of the housing queries received, are accompanied by affordability and debt issues. Staff can identify issues which are often hidden and not the primary reason for the call.
Our Options and Advice Officers provide Housing Advice to anyone who presents as needing help with housing, offers preventative advice to avoid homelessness which includes welfare benefits and budgeting advice. Staff also refer for additional help to the floating support providers already mentioned, or for more complex cases onto Shelter Dab team, which the team commissioned to be set up in conjunction with Supporting People.
During Covid-19 Options and Advice set up an Enhanced Advice Team to provide benefit advice to people affected by Covid-19 and were unaware of how to navigate the benefit system.
A Pre-Tenancy team provides advice and support to new tenants within Homes and Safer Communities Division. They provide:
· Welfare Benefit advise to ensure that tenants claim the correct benefit.
· Should the tenant need to move onto Universal Credit, they ensure that claims are made on time, in line with tenancy start dates.
· Complete Council Tax Reduction forms and Direct Debit mandates.
· Depending on eligibility, Discretionary Housing Payments and Discretionary Assistance Fund grants applications are made.
· Advice on eligibility for free school meals and uniform grants.
Within the Tenancy Support team of Options and Advice, we have a considerable number of staff who are competent in providing comprehensive Welfare Benefit advice. These officers also support tenants to:
· make applications for Discretionary Housing Payment,
· Help-U applications to reduce the cost of their water rates,
· Council Tax Reduction Forms
· Signposting to energy efficiency help. They also advise tenants on
eligibility for free school meals and uniform grants.
Simple Lettings manages properties on behalf of private landlords and the Tenancy Support Officers who work in this team provide the same services to the Private Rented Sector tenants as the Tenancy Support Officers do with Council Tenants. To reiterate – we offer this advice to our tenants and private tenants across the county.
All our Tenancy Support Officers, Options Advisors and Housing Officers are verified to allocate food vouchers and often deliver these to those tenants who are unable to collect parcels. We also send electronic vouchers to anyone needing an urgent parcel.
Within our Revenues and Benefits Team, we have aPersonal Budgeting Officer providing financial support cross tenure, which includes:
· Benefit maximisation advice;
· Helping service users to identify where expenditures can be reduced and how;
· Referral to specialist support providers such as Catchup, Shelter Cymru, energy efficiency personnel or floating support providers within the community;
· Apply for DAF grants;
· Help U reductions from Welsh Water;
· Discretionary Housing Payments and
· Issuing foodbank vouchers.
The point I’m making is that we are absolutely on point with regard to being pro-active with our collaborative programme with embedding others within our teams in housing and the hubs etc. and making sure that we inform people as to what benefits they are entitled to and how to apply successfully for those.
Supplementary Question by Councillor Alun Lenny:
Some neighbouring Local Authorities have opted for a single centralised access point for welfare support. Are there reasons why this is not considered an option in Carmarthenshire?
Response by Councillor Emlyn Dole, Leader of the Council:-
I am aware that some Local Authorities have created a single access point and I can see how that may work in areas where there is one single central point conveniently accessible to all and that may work well for them. However, to do so in Carmarthenshire, in my view, would increase the hardship and decrease the accessibility of support outlined in my original response.
I have no ambition to pull all this into one central unit and removing staff from integrated and strategic positions to some centralised unit, to do so would be counterproductive. It would also lead to an inevitable removal of funding from third sector organisations in order to fund this central unit. So I will continue to ask and assess how well the third sector are providing the services we fund.
You noted in your original question that we have a bleak winter ahead of us and we do, in many ways, but I would like to assure you that we have services in place to support our residents in all corners of the county and that we have plans in place, and will continue to plan, ensuring that this support continues.
I know that as Members we receive calls, letters, emails and are approached by some of our residents when they are facing difficulties. I would encourage you to familiarise yourselves with the services we offer so that you can play your part in supporting those facing hardship and to ensure that they do not fall through the net.