While Downing Street parties are undoubtedly among the most depressing things to come out of the pandemic, one of the most impressive things was the community response to clearing hospital beds and mobilising community volunteers to distribute food and collect prescriptions for people forced to shield at home. In Clean Slate’s home town of Bath, we joined the local community hub on call to support people struggling financially and witnessed a mammoth collective effort as the voluntary sector rose to the occasion. I’m not sure the public fully appreciated the fact that where we’d been told for years that it was impossible to clear the NHS of ‘bedblockers’, they were suddenly cleared. And where we’ve always been told it’s impossible to bring all rough sleepers in off the streets, suddenly in they were. In addition to the heroic efforts of NHS and care home staff, a Dunkirk-spirit enterprise was underway, fuelled by communities refusing to take ‘no can do’ for an answer.

In November, the Quids In Professional Network staged its first online event to explore the practical steps we might all collectively take to support Universal Credit claimants hit by the withdrawal of the £20-a-week emergency uplift. Although the network is 3,000 members strong, we didn’t know if it would just be me and three other speakers sharing our best ideas on how we might help. We were keen for the webinar not to look at just policy or campaigning for a reversal of the decision but to focus on ways claimants might mitigate the financial impact with a few critical steps. In less than a week, Surviving a Winter of Discontent: UC and the Lessons from the Frontline had sold out.

With the brilliant support of Anthony Richards from Swansea City Council, who provided us with context and an understanding of what poverty means in the post-lockdown world, and Ian Cory, welfare reform manager at Aster Housing, sharing a housing provider-eye view, the scene was set. Jo Goodman, financial inclusion senior manager at The Trussell Trust, rounded things off with the sobering stats they’re seeing around rocketing food insecurity.

I led on Clean Slate’s response to Covid. Lockdown meant our teams had to work remotely with phone and online support, but the basis for that support is our Future-Proof Finance Quiz and the pandemic meant we quickly proved the quiz didn’t have to be solely a face-to-face offering. But, like UC itself, it puts digital inclusion in the spotlight. So often financial inclusion efforts don’t include digital inclusion, and vice versa. But the changing world of UC means claimants need both skillsets, which is why we’re proud partners in the Nobody In The Dark Campaign.

But Clean Slate can only do so much. There are an estimated 14.5 million people in the UK in absolute poverty – so how do we reach them? It’s increasingly clear that the answer to that question is collaboration. Partnership working, sharing good practice, speaking the right language (literally as well as figuratively), making sure our money guidance materials get into the hands and on to the screens of the right people. These tactics, along with the Dunkirk spirit that inspired so much positive action at the start of this whole thing, will be what takes our service into the post-pandemic landscape.
The webinar, Surviving a Winter of Discontent, is available to view here. We’re hopeful it won’t be the last time we do something like this – so watch this space.