For those of us on the frontline, it can be hard to tell if policymakers know how people trapped in poverty seek help. Community leaders tell Quids in! Pro why the Crisis and Resilience Fund must invest in trusting relationships, not just formal institutions.
The UK government and local authorities have framed the Crisis and Resilience Fund (CRF) as a move away from short-term emergency grants towards financial sustainability for households. Yet, for millions living hand to mouth, statutory support often feels disconnected from their daily reality. Recent debates around household hardship, (not least at Quids in! Pro webinars), have highlighted the tension between immediate relief and long-term security.
For money advisers, community groups and housing providers, the question remains: How can public investment reach the most marginalised households and do we need to challenge rigid assumptions governing crisis spending?
The Geography of Trust
Poverty is never merely a financial deficit. It is an isolating, all-consuming condition that breeds embarrassment and distrust of officialdom. When pushed to the brink, households rarely approach civic centres or formal advice agencies. In many cases, statutory bodies are the very entities enforcing council tax arrears, rent debt, or benefit deductions.
Clair Gilbraith, chief executive of Advice At Hart, an independent community interest company embedded in Hartlepool for seven years, sees this every day. “Because we are well established within the voluntary sector, we are trusted by those who come to us,” she explains. “Previously our service users may have had bad experiences, or they don’t want to go to council settings where these agencies may give support.”
The physical setting matters as much as the advice. “The issues people have may be with the local authority and as such don’t want to go into a council building for support,” Gilbraith notes. “We have their trust to do what we can to help.”
“In a lot of cases I feel we are more approachable,” Gilbraith adds. “People also like continuity of support in those who they trust. All our staff at some point have lived experience and this comes across to our service users.”
The Sanctuary of Community
Where statutory agencies face reluctance, neighbourhood spaces find people walk through their open doors. Across the UK, informal hubs have become the frontline of social safety. The Warm Welcome Network coordinates more than 6,000 spaces, including libraries, cafes, and church halls, offering warmth, hot drinks, food, and company if people want it.
Helena Russell, Partnerships Manager at the Warm Welcome Network, explains that these spaces engage people long before they contemplate statutory help. “Warm Welcome Spaces are trusted, familiar places within local communities where people can come as they are, without judgement or any expectation that they need to ask for help,” she says. “We know that for a lot of people, taking the first step towards formal support can feel daunting. And many don’t necessarily identify themselves as someone who needs help.”
Removing the stigma of asking allows dialogue to develop naturally. “A community space is somewhere someone already visits to meet others, have a cup of tea, or feel less isolated,” Russell observes. “That existing relationship creates an opportunity for conversations to happen naturally and for people to feel comfortable opening up when they are ready.”
This presence provides an early intervention route. As Russell stresses, the network offers a vital chance “to reach people who might otherwise be missed, or before they have reached crisis point. These Spaces aren’t a replacement for specialist advice but they can play a vital role in helping people access support before difficulties escalate.”
Bridging the Confidence Gap
Ironically, though, thousands of neighbourhood organisations live hand to mouth themselves, relying on volunteer goodwill and precarious grants. While frontline hosts excel at hospitality, they often lack confidence or tools to navigate personal finance.
“Community spaces are built on relationships and the people running them care deeply about the people who walk through their doors,” Russell explains. “But wanting to help and feeling confident about how to help are two different things, especially when it comes to something as personal as money.”
Expecting volunteers to become caseworkers is unrealistic. “We need to recognise that volunteers and Space leads shouldn’t be expected to become financial advisers,” says Russell. “What can make a real difference is giving them the confidence, knowledge, and practical tools to start a conversation, understand what might be helpful, and connect people with appropriate support.”
This is where cross-sector partnerships are vital. Social enterprises like Clean Slate take money guidance into community hubs. Equipping grassroots teams with coaching frameworks, money health-checks, and digital CashPointer kiosks enables hosts to guide residents toward unclaimed benefits, social tariffs, and budgeting confidence, frequently unlocking hundreds of pounds in direct gains.
In Gloucestershire, district councils pair data from the Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT) with grassroots outreach, deploying money coaching in deprived areas to support families. In Bath, Clean Slate partners with Developing Health & Independence (DHI) to embed financial guidance directly into housing and addiction recovery programmes.
The Regulatory Stumbling Block
This collaborative vision is far from universal and administrative barriers are emerging where authorities are applying business-as-usual commissioning to CRF. In Hartlepool, the council is undermining groups like Advice at Hart by requiring CRF services to be led by organisations regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). Inevitably, with general advice agencies stepping forward, this squeezes out opportunities for those who are specialists in community engagement.
FCA accreditation is a criterion virtually unheard of, to date, in CRF commissioning. While councils must ensure competent advice, blanket FCA regulation confuses formal debt advice, like Debt Relief Orders or insolvency, with preventative money guidance, such as benefits checks and budgeting support.
“They serve different purposes, operate under different requirements, and intervene at different stages of financial hardship,” Clair Gilbraith argues. “If funders misunderstand this distinction, they risk overlooking some of the most important work that prevents a household’s financial difficulties from escalating into a crisis. This is the work that we do that doesn’t need to be regulated.”
The consequence is smaller charities holding deep community trust are barred from bidding entirely. “Organisations like ourselves who don’t provide debt advice that is regulated can’t therefore take part in the bidding for CRF,” Gilbraith explains, warning that service users ultimately lose out. “Instead of it being one bid and all the regulations attached it should have been split into different sections so that more organisations could provide the services.”
Quids in! put these issues to Hartlepool Borough Council but it did not respond to requests for comment.
Investing in Community Infrastructure
Hartlepool’s barrier highlights a broader flaw in public procurement. Monolithic tenders that favour large organisations with dedicated bid-writing teams will always bypass local groups with the strongest of community ties, especially in deprived neighbourhoods.
Gilbraith calls for a fundamental shift: “They need to move away from the models that make it only accessible for the larger organisations to provide the service. Put trust in the community organisations that meet people that are in a crisis and are trusted by the community.”
Helena Russell agrees that commissioning must support shared ecosystems: “Our hope is that trusted community spaces are seen as part of the solution, alongside specialist advice services, rather than outside the system of support… There should be ways to fund partnerships that bring together grassroots reach and specialist knowledge.” Investing in this infrastructure is essential: “If we want to build genuine financial resilience, we need to invest not only in responding to crisis, but also in the trusted community infrastructure that can help prevent people from reaching it in the first place.”
Comprehensive Change
To ensure the Crisis and Resilience Fund fulfils its promise, anti-poverty practitioners advocate three key reforms:
- Distinguish Money Guidance from Regulated Advice: Benefit checks, income maximisation, and digital inclusion do not require FCA authorisation, and can often break of household hardship. Imposing unnecessary regulation creates an artificial barrier that strangles opportunities to build resilience.
- Move Beyond Monolithic Procurement: Local authorities should split tenders into accessible lots or mandate genuine consortium models, ensuring funding resources neighbourhood charities rather than defaulting exclusively to large regional contractors.
- Invest in Collaborative Grassroots Capacity: Public funds should support capacity-building partnerships. Equipping community hubs with coaching frameworks and digital tools like CashPointers transforms everyday spaces into accessible gateways for lasting resilience, not just crisis interventions.
If we are serious about ending poverty, we must meet people where they feel safe. Formal, regulated debt advice is an indispensable emergency service, but it arrives when the house is already on fire. Lasting resilience is longer-term, built on trusting relationships and, where possible, begins much earlier. If central and local government fail to invest in that community foundation, they risk locking out the very people the Crisis and Resilience Fund was created for.
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