Eastbourne Foodbank celebrates National Lottery funding to support people facing hardship
Funding from The National Lottery means the foodbank can continue to provide emergency support for Eastbourne people in financial crisis and work towards a whole-community response to poverty.
Eastbourne Foodbank has a warehouse in Brampton Road but provides emergency essentials and advice at satellites across the town in halls and community centres. The anti-poverty charity is working to end the need for large-scale foodbanks and will use the money to continue to provide emergency support, build financial resilience, get people involved in volunteering and come together as a whole community response to the effects of poverty in Eastbourne.
Eastbourne Foodbank has been established as a charity since 2011 and is powered by 135 amazing local volunteers. It was founded by Howard Wardle MBE who also introduced an in-house financial inclusion team to get to the root causes of poverty and lift people up and out of financial crisis.
The charity has built upon this work over the years and now runs five satellite foodbanks a week. Along with access to emergency food and toiletries for themselves and their families for three days, people facing financial hardship are welcomed in with a cup of tea and a snack, a listening ear, and introduced to wider support via the range of specialist local agencies who co-locate within the foodbank satellites. People are offered debt and welfare advice through their in-house service, and offered the opportunity to gain skills, confidence, connection and wellbeing through their inclusive volunteering, which aims to achieve lasting stability.
The new funding from The National Lottery Community Fund, which distributes money raised by National Lottery players for good causes and is the largest community funder in the UK, will enable around 867,303 meals to be provided for people facing financial crisis over the next four years.
The foodbank will also be able to support around 3,600 people to stabilize their finances, to move up and out of poverty, with some people going on to give back via their inclusive volunteering programme.
Jess Holliday, CEO Eastbourne Foodbank, said: “We’re delighted that The National Lottery Community Fund has recognised our work in this way and we are incredibly grateful for this funding. We are committed to working towards a town where a large-scale foodbank is not needed and there is a whole-community response to the root causes of poverty. ”
A foodbank volunteer said: “I think one of the great strengths of the foodbank is the culture of inclusivity, friendliness and sincerity and to note this is real and meaningful - it isn't just fine words in a policy statement.”
The National Lottery Community Fund recently launched its strategy, ‘It starts with community’, which will underpin its efforts to distribute at least £4 billion of National Lottery funding by 2030.
As part of this, the funder has four key missions, which are to support communities to come together, be environmentally sustainable, help children and young people thrive and enable people to live healthier lives.
National Lottery players raise more than £30 million a week for good causes across the UK. Thanks to them, last year (2023/24) The National Lottery Community Fund awarded over half a billion pounds (£686.3 million) of life-changing funding to communities across the UK, supporting over 13,700 projects to turn their great ideas into reality.
To find out more visit www.TNLCommunityFund.org.uk