CEO Martin Auton-Lloyd of the charity Family Support Work welcomed his guests to the town hall in Rye to celebrate their ongoing support, to raise awareness and to promote fundraising. The president of this charity is the Bishop of Chichester from the Anglican Diocese of Chichester., and the patrons are HM lord-lieutenants of East and West Sussex. The diocese makes a contribution to our work with an annual grant and support from over 100 individual churches.
So what does Family Support work offer vulnerable children and families throughout Sussex?
It helps with housing, debt, mental health issues, autism, literacy among parents, children with challenging behaviour at school and whatever is deemed important and helpful for families to move forward for a brighter future. It provides trips out for the whole family, a chance to have a week away in a caravan at Winchelsea beach, and parcels of toys to children at Christmas.
The unique quality of this charity is the fact that families or children remain on the books until it is felt that they can move on independently, no time limit being set. In many cases the support is much longer than six weeks’ intervention. The results, therefore, are long-lasting and give a better future a possibility of forever.
There are twenty-three practitioners who cover the area from Portsmouth to Crawley and they receive their referrals from a wide spectrum of people involved in these children’s lives including teachers, social services, clergy, and health visitors. There were three practitioners at the event, one being in charge of the Rye families, and they chatted to those present to enable them to understand more clearly the work that they do.
Mr Auton-Lloyd welcomed everyone to the evening explaining to the supporters gathered in the town hall the importance of the work that Family Support does: “It is really good to be able to have a practitioner based here in Rye and working in the surrounding villages. So often areas like this get overlooked. What people see often is the town hall, the beautiful church and the ancient parts of the town but what is not perceived are all the hidden challenges that people in this area live with. It is one of the things that I have been very keen on highlighting as we recognise the needs of Hastings, Worthing and Bognor Regis where there are massive problems in large areas of deprivation. But in areas like Rye everyone sees the pretty exterior and few people recognise the scale of the challenges, so it is really important to highlight the areas where help is needed. However, we are totally funded by voluntary donations and don’t deliver services for any of the statutory services. Everything we do relies on our supporters, and we have a marvellous team of fundraisers both in our main office and in local areas. We also receive a lot of grant funding which makes our work possible.
“We have a lady based in Rye, Gill, who works with families in a way that is carefully designed to support them. We never go in and do an intervention; we go in and get to know the family, because if its members would benefit from change, you cannot expect that just because you say that is best for them, they will accept the need. They might in the short term but to make lasting long-term difference you need to build that deep relationship so that they start to change things for themselves. You work together, you develop a partnership, and you work together. It is an incredibly skilled job which takes a lot of patience and a lot of time but the results with many of the families are long-lasting. We need to give the families that we work with the opportunities to make real changes so that they become more resilient, more self-sufficient and are able to take a full part in the community again. We are now seeing a greater number of families coming to us with special educational needs. A lot of our work is guiding parents and supporting them. We work holistically: we don’t just work with the children, we work with the whole family and that is what makes us different. One other major point to make is that we don’t put a time limit on how long we can help: If you want to make that lasting change you have to work at their speed.”
Cllr Andi Rivett, mayor of Rye, ended his welcome with these words: “This is an admirable charity very worthy of your support. And I know that it has already greatly assisted many families locally in this town of Rye. As mayor, on their behalf, I extend a big ‘thank you’ to everybody involved.”
Image Credits: Kt bruce .