There are no plans to award residents with a “blanket £250” in Bristol, the council has said. As part of the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) Household Support Fund, some councils across the country are giving out payments of up to £500.
Bristol City Council has been awarded a further £4m, with the funding being extended to March 2025. And a council spokeswoman said that, while it is still in the process of allocating this next round of funding, she gave some details on how this money will be spent.
She said: “Proposals for Bristol’s £4m allocation for the period October 2024 to March 2025 under HSF 6 are still to be presented to Strategy and Resources Policy committee. There is currently no proposal to award people with a blanket £250 based on individual circumstances/eligibility.
“We have however decided to use £1m of the £4m allocation to assist every child eligible for Free School Meals with a supermarket voucher of £15 for the October 2024 half term break and £30 for the Christmas holidays. We expect this to benefit around 23,000 children.
“Household Support Fund 5 which ran from April to September 2024 provided £4,039,965 of support via 284,227 awards to 80,922 households.”
Elsewhere in the area, South Gloucestershire Council is giving out items to the poorest households to “heat the person, not the home”. The council has secured £1.41 million from the Government’s Household Support Funding for the cold months ahead.
The money is set aside for residents who are struggling with the cost of food, energy, water and other essentials. There will also be 1,000 free packs that contain a bag, hot water bottle, thermal flask, reusable hand warmers, soup, hats, socks, gloves and a blanket for people who are having to choose between eating and heating this winter.
A spokesperson for South Gloucestershire Council said the aim of these packs is to “help people stay warm and well in the winter months by heating the person not the home”. It added most of the first batch of the free packs have already gone out directly to the residents that are eligible, and there will be more being sent out at the end of November.
North Somerset Council has also been successful in securing some funding as part of the HSF scheme. A North Somerset Council spokesperson said: “We’ll shortly be launching our £1.3m Household Support Fund scheme from now until 31 March 2025.
“The scheme design anticipates providing just under 20,000 awards across a range of areas. It will focus on a campaign to increase the uptake of the Winter Fuel Allowance via the qualification for pension credits.
“We are also continuing to provide around 5200 awards to families of children in receipt of free school meals, our 11, 500 customers who received Council Tax and several smaller vulnerable groups such as care leavers. Typically, a standard award is £50 but this may be increased depending on circumstances.
“Additionally, funding is being shared with partner organisations such as the Citizens Advice Bureau to enhance our ethical debt recovery programme and provide advice on fuel and other welfare offers. North Somerset allocated all of the £1.3m worth of funding for 1 April 2024 to 30 Sept 2024 across similar groups of residents.”