Issue - meetings

The Cabinet Member for Community Leadership and Engagement introduced a progress report on the Borough response to the cost-of-living crisis.

Building on the community-led response that proved so effective during the COVID-19 pandemic, the Council and social sector partners were working together to support local residents in the face of the worsening impact of fuel, heating and food cost rises, alongside generally rising levels of inflation.  The high level of deprivation in the Borough meant that those factors were having an increasingly significant impact on a large proportion of the Borough, many of whom were already struggling to make ends meet, and the situation would only get worse as winter approached.

The Cabinet Member referred to initiatives already introduced in the Borough to support local residents, such as BD CAN and the Homes and Money Hub.  A key initiative under the new proposals would be the establishment of a Cost-of-Living Alliance, which arose from a recent Cost-of-Living Summit arranged by the Council.  The Alliance would involve Council service teams delivering a package of training that would enable social sector partners to support residents before they hit crisis point, as part of a preventative approach, while supporting other community groups in the local area. The Citizens Advice Bureau would play a central co-ordinating role, working closely with the Homes and Money Hub, while offering an option for escalation for those residents whose situation was more severe.  In addition, the Council was leading on ways for partners to collaboratively access funding from Central Government and other sources that could be used to support residents who were having difficulties.

Cabinet Members criticised the Government for its lack of understanding of, and response to, the cost-of-living crisis and commended the proactive action being taken by the Council and social sector partners to mitigate the impact on a local level.  It was also noted that although the Council had recently secured funding of circa £1.2m towards addressing health inequalities in the Borough, if the Government used the 2021 census data for the allocation of local authority funding the Council would be receiving an additional £20m per annum.

Cabinet resolved to:

(i)  Note the development of a Cost-of-Living Alliance, the steps towards its formation and required activity to further develop the model; and

(ii)  Note that a further report shall be presented in October 2022 to update the Cabinet on the development of the Alliance.