- Area:
- South West England
- Programme:
- Multiple and Complex Needs
- Release date:
- 27 3 2013
The BIG Lottery Fund (BIG) is announcing today that a partnership in Bristol is now on its way to receiving up to £10m to better support people with multiple problems such as homelessness, mental ill health, addiction and reoffending.
BIG is awarding £50,000 to the partnership in Bristol led by Second Step to help submit business plans on how they will improve and better coordinate services to tackle the needs of people living chaotic lives, in order to receive up to £10m. Nine other successful partnerships across England are also on the verge of receiving a share of the £100m investment.
With problem drug users alone costing government and society around £46,000 a year, BIG’s £100m investment which aims to help thousands of people, could save the public purse hundreds of millions of pounds.
BIG’s investment, backed by Jon Snow Mitch Winehouse and Russell Brand, has brought together organisations and bodies that tackle these issues to improve the stability, confidence and capability of people with multiple and complex needs to lead better lives so they spend less time in prison, reduce their drug abuse, are in stable accommodation and have better mental health.
Research has demonstrated a strong overlap between homelessness and complex needs in Bristol (JRF Multiple Exclusion Homelessness Research Programme 2011). The adults with complex needs have experienced extreme forms of homelessness and a high incidence of self-harm and suicide attempts. Of 549 homeless people who accessed Bristol Wellbeing Service in 2011/12, 77 per cent of therapy clients had experienced two or more traumatic events. Safer Bristol estimates there were 4,777 opiate/crack users in 2010/11.
The vision for the Bristol partnership, consisting of eight organisations, is for people with complex needs to be able to drive their own recovery, rather than be pushed into what other people think they need. Existing services will be made more accessible and tailored, and therefore understanding the psychology and background of people with multiple needs will be at the heart of the project. Service providers will sign up to a commitment to tailor services to meet individual needs and not refuse those deemed difficult to work with. Service users will be supported by co-ordinators who will act as a single, trusted point of contact and ensure they direct their own recovery. In addition, peer mentors will share the journey with the client to provide support and empathy. Working across Bristol, it is estimated that up to 1,200 people will benefit from the project.
Aileen Edwards, CEO of Second Step, said: “It’s absolutely fantastic news for Bristol, where agencies work hard together but this will bring such a big boost by solving problems for people falling in and out of services. We want to congratulate the Big Lottery Fund for this initiative which will enable us to take a long term view about solving some structural problems. We are so excited about finding innovative and creative solutions and we really believe it’s going to make a fundamental difference to people in Bristol getting what they need.”
Alison Rowe, Big Lottery Fund England Head of Communications, said: “There are countless statistics demonstrating a need to help people with multiple and complex needs – for example the NHS Confederation found that 70 per cent of prisoners suffer from a mental illness and a substance abuse problem.
“Imagine a world where service delivery gives individuals the power to turn their lives around – our ultimate goal is to use the learning gleaned from this investment to shift policy thinking so that individuals become assets rather than just a drain on society.’
Jon Snow, Channel 4 News Presenter and Chair of the New Horizon Youth Centre, said: “I have worked for some four decades in a project that works with vulnerable and homeless young people and I have rarely ever come across funding targeted directly at supporting people of any age with multiple and complex needs.
“That’s why I am so excited by the Big Lottery Fund’s radically new approach to put £100 million behind bringing the assorted services together behind this needy but difficult group of people.
“I believe this initiative is going to make life changing differences to the lives of very many people previously regarded as on the margins of society. I’m particularly attracted to the way the Big Lottery Fund has engaged the client groups themselves in designing services.
“In austere and difficult times, the Big Lottery Fund is laying the foundations toward making a profound difference. I’m honoured to support their endeavour.”
Mitch Winehouse, who alongside family members established The Amy Winehouse Foundation, said: “Since losing Amy I have been supporting charities that help people who are struggling with an addiction or health issue. I’ve been involved with Big Lottery Fund since the start of this investment and I’m very excited that successful partnerships are now on the verge of receiving up to £10 million to start helping people with serious and complex problems. This money will bring different organisations together to offer people more tailored support to deal with all the different needs that they may have.”
Russell Brand said: "The BIG Lottery Fund is investing 100m in people with complex needs - this means alcoholics, homeless folk, mentally ill people and drug addicts. They will be devising a strategy in collaboration with the beneficiaries - this is a unique and outstanding initiative that will significantly advance our society. The BIG Lottery Fund has a simple solution to complex needs - now I might buy a bloody ticket!"
Over the eight-year investment, BIG will track the success of the partnerships and gather evidence that will shed light on more effective and efficient ways of organising and delivering services including tracking the savings and benefits to the wider community as well as to the individuals who are supported. BIG will use this learning to improve practice amongst the projects it funds, to influence future policy and practice and encourage the continuation of successful interventions.
CASE STUDY – Richard Shaw (Second Step, Bristol).
Richard, 41, is originally from Salford but now lives in Bristol. A sufferer of depression and schizophrenia, Richard experienced his first episode in a psychiatric unit aged just 10. He worked in the army for three years but then became an alcoholic in his early 20s following a relationship breakdown, which severed contact with his young daughter. Richard suffered poor mental health alongside alcohol dependency, and deterred by previous negative experiences of statutory services, did not ask for help and spent the next eight years homeless, drinking and drug taking in Blackpool.
Discharged from another psychiatric unit with nowhere to go, Richard travelled to Bristol and visited The Bristol Hub, which provides homeless people with advice and support. He accessed temporary accommodation and later a flat, and was referred to Second Step, which provides help for homeless people facing mental health problems. They provided outreach visits three times a week to help with accommodation issues such as getting furniture and paying bills, but also offered emotional support. Richard accessed their services for around a decade. He is now sober, manages his mental health problems, is back in contact with his family and has worked on the Board of Directors at Second Step helping to write and deliver training courses. He also chairs a service user involvement group examining new policies, and advises Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership NHS Trust regarding the assessment process.
Richard said: “Second Step took on everything. They took all my worries away from me, giving me the time and the space to be able to concentrate on my alcohol dependency and mental health. I had been suicidal for years and had been in hospital having cut myself or taken an overdose. I haven’t self-harmed for five years now. I was on my lowest ebb and they picked me up, dusted me down and made sure I was alright. It really is a wonderful service.
“I fell through all the gaps in statutory services before. It was a problem for Second Step and they picked me up and they helped me with my problems, and now I am not drinking and I am not homeless. When you are living in B&Bs you don’t have a home, you just have somewhere to lay your head. Second Step helped me get a home. It must be a benefit to society – if you don’t sort people out they will fall into someone’s budget somewhere.”
A total list of the eight organisations involved in the partnership is as follows:
Second Step (lead partner), Citizen With Experience, Bristol Drugs Project, Missing Link and Next Link, St Mungo’s, Avon and Somerset Probation Trust, Support Against Racist Incidents (SARI) and Avon and Wiltshire Mental Health Partnership Trust.
Big Lottery Fund Press Office: 020 7211 1888
Out of hours media contact: 07867 500 572
Full details of the Big Lottery Fund programmes and grant awards are available on the website: www.biglotteryfund.org.uk
Ask BIG a question here: https://ask.biglotteryfund.org.uk
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Notes to Editors
There are an estimated 60,000 adults in England with multiple needs who are beset by several problems at once and lack effective contact with services that support across all their needs. - Making Every Adult Matter (2009).
An estimate of direct annual expenditure on an ‘average’ adult with multiple needs in 2006 was around £23,000. David Halpern, Social exclusion: bringing opportunity for all,
Presentation at Chequers, 29th August, 2006.
Home Office research has suggested a problem drug user costs the government £10,400 a year in reactive expenditure and in social costs around £35,450.
Department of Health figures suggest it is four times more expensive for hospitals to care for homeless people.
St Mungos homeless service found 69% of their hostel clients who were former rough sleepers had some form of mental health problem.
• The Big Lottery Fund (BIG), the largest distributor of National Lottery good cause funding, is responsible for giving out 40% of the money raised for good causes by the National Lottery.
• BIG is committed to bringing real improvements to communities and the lives of people most in need and has been rolling out grants to health, education, environment and charitable causes across the UK. Since June 2004 BIG has awarded over £6bn.
• The Fund was formally established by Parliament on 1 December 2006.
• Since the National Lottery began in 1994, 28p from every pound spent by the public has gone to good causes. As a result, over £29 billion has now been raised and more than 383,000 grants awarded across arts, sport, heritage, charities, health, education and the environment.
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