- Area:
- Scotland
- Programme:
- Making it Work
- Release date:
- 17 4 2013
The Big Lottery Fund (BIG) Scotland today (17 APRIL) announces a package of funding worth up to £7 million to support Scotland’s poorest single parent families. The Making it Work scheme will help lone parents tackle the many challenges they face in getting into the job market.
It is estimated that there are over 174,000 lone parents with 295,000 children in Scotland. Just below half are living in income poverty. While many lone parents want to work, escalating competition for jobs along with the challenge of finding the right childcare can mean some struggle to sustain or secure a job.
Big Lottery Fund Scotland Director, Jackie Killeen said: “Making it Work has a big ambition: to improve the lives of single parent families. The five partnerships we are supporting today have taken approaches which suit their local needs and circumstances. We want to see services such as education, employability and childcare coming together to help create a more holistic service and give lone parent families a better chance of a brighter future.”
Fife Making it Work will support vulnerable lone parents to secure work or get ready for employment. Fife Gingerbread will lead a partnership group – Fife Council Education & Learning, Citizens Advice & Rights Fife, Scottish Childminding Association and One Parent Families Scotland. Their grant of £1,250,001 means support workers can provide advice and help with personal skills, confidence, coping strategies, resilience and employability. Intensive, tailored support and an ongoing action plan will help lone parents into volunteering, education, training or employment.
Rhona Cunningham, Manager of Fife Gingerbread, said: “Fife Gingerbread is delighted to have been given this award from Big Lottery Fund Scotland. We are a small independent, grass-roots organisation and today’s funding will allow us to develop and to continue to work alongside our partners, sustaining our joint work in the community with local families.”
Lana is a lone parent with four children who was referred to Fife Gingerbread because she has mental health issues and needed help for herself and her children. Fife Gingerbread gave Lana emotional support and put her in touch with other agencies for help with issues that were affecting her family’s health and wellbeing. Taking part in group sessions gave Lana the confidence to get out and about and become part of her community. Peer support also helped and as her self-esteem and skills improved she became a volunteer with Fife Gingerbread’s Buddy Project as a Buddy Mentor for Central Fife.
Over the last year, along with other Buddy volunteers, Lana has worked with The Poverty Alliance in the development and delivery of research called ‘Surviving Poverty - The Impact of Lone Parenthood’. The research has been acknowledge by MSP's, motioned at the Scottish Parliament, and has now been heard in the House of Lords. Lana’s development and achievements are fundamental to her future goals. She’s about to complete an HNC in Working with Communities as well as keeping up her volunteering commitments, completing the research, and caring for her four children. Lana is an inspiration to lone parents and has challenged and removed many barriers in her life to create a positive future for herself and her children.
Frances Chisholm, Press Team Scotland: 0141 242 1458
Public Enquiries Line: 0300 123 7110 Text phone: 0845 6021 659
Full details of the Big Lottery Fund programmes and grant awards are available on the website:
www.biglotteryfund.org.uk
• Making it work is targeting Glasgow, Edinburgh, Fife, North and South Lanarkshire.
• 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. 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 £25 billion over £28 billion has now been raised and more than 383,000 grants awarded across arts, sport, heritage, charities, health, education and the environment.
• The Scotland Committee, has been making Big Lottery Fund decisions on Scottish projects since March 2007. As well as taking devolved decisions on Lottery spending, the Committee, led by Chair, Maureen McGinn, has and will continue to play a strategic role in the future direction of BIG in Scotland.
• The Big Lottery Fund is investing in Scotland’s communities through its Investing in Communities portfolio, as well as the small grants schemes Awards for All, Investing in Ideas, Communities and Families and 2014 Communities.
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