Purpose

This report seeks approval to continue to fund VCS organizations
Families4Peace and HealthProm for their ongoing
provision of community-based support to Ukrainian refugees in
Camden, especially those living in the borough as part of the Homes
For Ukraine community sponsorship scheme.
 
Families4Peace and HealthProm have been providing
valuable advocacy and specialist support for Ukrainian refugees in
Camden since 2022. The options they provide include 121 casework
which is culturally tuned and trauma informed. They have also
proved adept at working collaboratively and constructively with
Council and statutory services and have emerged as leading VCS
partners in the Council’s Ukrainian refugee response.
 
Both organizations are able to reach the most vulnerable
Ukrainian households and have established relationships of trust
and empathy across the Ukrainian refugee community, using Ukrainian
language skills and cultural expertise.
 
Both organizations have also been responsive to the development
of the Camden Borough of Sanctuary (BoS) VCS Forum and
have helped to show other organisations what can be possible
through collaboration and through their leadership.
 
There will be continued presence of Ukrainian refugees in the
borough, arising from the prolonged conflict in their home country
and uncertainty about the future. This situation presents an
ongoing need for this community access to specialist support built
on trust and meaningful engagement in community spaces.
 
Current Council funding awards for both organizations, as
approved by the Director of Equalities and Community Strength, end
30th September 2024.
 
The report asks the Executive Director of Corporate Services to
approve continuation of grant funding for Families4Peace and
HealthProm beyond the current funding awards, to cover
the period 1st October 2024 through 31st March 2026, with grants to
each organization of up to a maximum amount of £50,000 per
year (including funding amounts already awarded for the period 1st
April – 30th September 2024) and up to a maximum combined
total amount for grants to both organizations not to exceed
£80,000 per year.
 
 

Content

THAT the Executive Director of
Corporate Services, in consultation with the Cabinet Member for
Voluntary Sector, Equalities and Cohesion:
 

1.       agrees funding
for grants to Families4Peace and HealthProm, as lead
VCS partners in the Ukrainian refugee response, for award of an
individual grant to each organization of up to a maximum amount of
£50,000 per year (combined total per organization including
existing interim funding covering April-September 2024), and of a
combined total for both grants not to exceed £80,000 per
year, for the period April - through 31st March 2025 in the first
instance, with the option of an extension through 31st March 2026,
as set out in Sections 2 and 3 of this report, and
2.
      authorises the Director
of Equalities and Community Strength to take all administrative
actions required to implement recommendation 1 including ending the
grants or renewing and adjusting funding levels after March 2025 as
described in Sections 2 and 3 of this report.