Minutes:
The Chair welcomed the Mayor, Executive Member for Finance, Director of Public Health and Head of Resident and Business Support to the meeting.
It was explained that the presentations to be delivered constituted an overview of the Board’s review into poverty. It was also explained there would be two presentations: the first covering the Welfare Strategy and the second covering the Poverty Sprint.
The Head of Resident and Business Support delivered her presentation, regarding the Welfare Strategy, which included the following points:
· It was important to share the work being undertaken by the Council to support poverty in the town.
· The initiatives described in the presentation had been commended and awarded in 2023.
· There were 11 themes being delivered. Those included food poverty, Section 13A funds and centralising debt collection teams.
· Several initiatives had seen quantifiable actions, including work with Public Health colleagues, to identify those eligible for free school means but not claiming them. This had led to an additional 546 recipients.
· The Resident and Business Support Team was expanding to include debt management support. This was required as some residents were planning their finances on a day-to-day basis.
· Crisis support was available for residents who had lost access to their money with over £55,000 worth of funding made available. This support had been crucial to those in need of it.
· 81 referrals had been to the MEC equating to over £3,000 in energy vouchers.
· In terms of centralisation of debt, there had been 59 credits moved to support debt.
· There had been over 8,000 Housing Benefit Claims with over £42 million of funding made available.
· In terms of Household Support Fund (HSF), the government had continued their support and as such 65,245 awards had been made, totalling over £3 million distributed. Households could receive multiple awards rathe than just one award.
· Overall, over 37,000 HSF awards were made to households with children, over 6,000 awards were awarded to households with pensioners and more than 21,000 awards were made to other household types.
· Support had been delivered through a combination of vouchers, cash payments and physical goods.
· Importantly, households were eligible for support if they fell outside the benefit window but were in employment.
· In total there had been a total of 234,987 awards made under Household Support Fund totalling £10,662,772.
The Chair thanked the Head of Resident and Business Support for her presentation and invited questions from the Board.
A Member thanked the service area for their work and commented that a benefit awareness session had taken place in his ward several years ago. It was queried if this would be repeated. It was clarified there were plans to expand the team to cover such work and that officer would link in with community hubs to target those in need.
A discussion took place regarding the family resilience fund and how residents were being navigated to different places for support. It was important to drill down into the issues facing those in need to understand what support could be offered. However, debt management was a crucial element of support, as many people were spending money too early and not making efforts to budget.
It was commented that in Hemlington Ward Citizens Advice Bureau sessions were available and residents could book one of the sessions via the local library. It was also commented that more information could be made available on the Council’s website regarding what support was available. Internally, a welfare support directory was available on the Council’s Intranet pages. Thanks were expressed to the officers in the Resident and Business Support Service.
A Member queried how people could be made aware of the support available. It was commented that applications for benefit support were sometimes associated with stigma. As such, a significant piece of work was required around communication, especially connecting with those households that were entitled to benefits but were not in receipt of them. It was found that word-of-mouth approaches worked better than leaflet and poster campaigns. It was also commented that whenever a contact was made with a resident, they were always directed to the Welfare Strategy.
It was asked if there were any connections to the Staying Put Agency. It was commented that some referrals were made, and it was important that both areas worked together to pool their knowledge. It was also commented that even if people were not entitled to benefits, support could still be offered around debt management.
A conversation took place during which the issue of how to connect with residents was discussed. It was reaffirmed that some residents were more challenging to connect with but that new roles in Resident and Business Support would help with this process. It was also reaffirmed that word-of-mouth approaches of connecting with residents had shown the most success rather than leaflet and poster campaigns. Following a query about collaboration with local chemists it was clarified that a pilot had taken place in some doctor’s surgeries, but many residents were reluctant to engage in that environment and as such the pilot had ceased. It was also stated the service was working with, and through, the Financial Improvement Group and therefore had some connections with Thirteen housing.
The Chair thanked the Head of Resident and Business Support for her presentation and invited the Director of Public Health to deliver his presentation on the Poverty Sprint.
As part of his presentation the following points were made:
· The Poverty Sprint was carried out over a two-week period.
· A central theme of the Council Plan was to support residents out of poverty.
· Middlesbrough was now the second most deprived Local Authority area in England. This was in contrast to it being the fifth most deprived area in 2019.
· 13 of the 90 Local Super Output Areas (LSOA) in the town were ranked as the top first most deprived out of 33,755 LSOAs.
· Newport Ward had the highest rate of child poverty of any ward in England.
· There was a need to maximise the Council’s approach to poverty via policy and strategy.
· There was a need for greater clarity around what the Council could do locally to achieve a greater impact on poverty.
· Several experts from different fields were invited to provide input to the Poverty Sprint. This included input from external stakeholders and partners.
· At a high level the issue of unsustainable personal debt affected all other factors in the town.
· The issue of poverty did not appear explicitly in many Council strategies and there was a tendency for the Council to develop policies and strategies on this matter in silos.
· There needed for a more joined-up strategic approach regarding poverty.
· There was also a disconnect between need and practice with front line staff not always being aware of what support was available.
· There was a requirement to signpost residents more effectively when a request for assistance was received.
· There was a need for strategic leadership in terms of housing as many housing strategies were out of date. The creation of such strategies required input from a range of key partners, as well as residents.
· There was a need to build a better and wider understanding of poverty in Middlesbrough, rather than trying to fix the immediate problem.
· The breadth and depth of poverty in the town was not fully understood by all officers and the establishment of a Poverty Action Network which encompassed the Financial Improvement Group should be explored.
· Services were disjointed and too focussed on tackling symptoms of poverty rather than root causes.
· There was a need for the Council to try and influence the Tees Valley Combined Authority to adopt a broader “public health” approach.
· The main consideration was trying to target people who did not present themselves to the Council. This included people that were working but struggling financially or those who had recently become economically inactive.
· In terms of crime and anti-social behaviour, tackling deprivation was not a focus of the Community Safety Plan. This, however, should be developed through a poverty lens.
· Consultation with communities should move to a long term sustained model of engagement and co-production. It was important the voice of people informed strategy creation.
· There was a lack of intelligence gathered from Council Services that worked in communities.
· In terms of skills and jobs, anchor institutions via the Tees Valley Anchor Network, should work to remove barriers where they existed. The Council should also work to challenge existing processes, where necessary.
· Improved health was also important to supporting poverty, with long term illness such as Musculo-skeletal and cardiovascular ailments being some of the most common. It was important to support GPs and the fit-note process to reduce the number of fit notes.
· In terms of proposals on how to address this issue as a Council, there was a need for the Council to stop working in silos and not to adopt to adopt single focus strategies.
· In terms of outstanding works for the Council, there was a need to collate intelligence from communities to inform service development.
· Housing was a key element to alleviate poverty and with the Council’s Head of Housing there was a need to align demand and supply.
The Chair thanked the Director of Public Health for his presentation and invited questions from the Board.
It was queried if the Selective Landlord Licensing scheme could be utilised to ensure that, in the view of new legislation, Landlords did not increase rents disproportionately. The Mayor commented that rental costs were driven by supply, and work to reduce the number of empty properties would help to regulate costs. However, there was a recognition the Council needed to be bolder in this approach.
A conversation took place during which it was discussed that, in terms of housing, the Integrated Care Board could play a role in working with the Council in this regard.
A Member queried how successful the Selecting Landlord Licensing Scheme had been and if it was planned to roll it out to other areas. The Mayor commented that Selective Landlord Licensing was sometimes difficult to monitor on larger scales. It was also a tool that should not be used in isolation. A more targeted application of the scheme, such as at street level, could be explored. The Mayor also commented there was a need for the Council to be more proactive in addressing properties that were not fit for purpose.
Given the relationship between education and poverty, and the need for the Council to work with schools to reduce permanent exclusions, a Member queried if any schools had been involved in the Poverty Sprint. It was confirmed that schools had not been directly involved and that the Council’s connections with some schools had been lost since academisation. While there had been attempts to engage with schools it was recognised they may not have had the capacity to attend partnership meetings.
The Chair commented that the North East Combined Authority was actively engaged in the Child Poverty agenda and queried if the TVCA could be more engaged in the poverty agenda generally. It was clarified that the TVCA was engaged with the poverty agenda, such as the introduction of the Care Leavers Bus Pass initiative, but it was acknowledged TVCA could be more engaged generally.
The Chair stated there seemed to be a dislocation between policy and strategy and asked if a standalone poverty strategy would be more beneficial than incorporating the poverty agenda into the Council Plan. It was clarified that, as the Council was no longer in an imminently challenging financial position, it could examine how best to address the poverty agenda and incorporate it into its day-to-day activities. While it was recognised there was potential to create a separate industry around this issue, it was also stated a poverty strategy, and the Council Plan, may not be mutually exclusive.
The Chair expressed his thanks for the presentations delivered and asked that the information be noted.
NOTED.