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Local welfare support for Suffolk residents

There are several schemes available to both tenants and home-owners to help those on low incomes manage this winter. We’ve listed some below and if you need help applying please contact us.

Warm Homes, Healthy People is an initiative run by Suffolk County Council which provides advice on energy use in your home and can help to make your home more energy-efficient. They can lend heaters if your boiler breaks down, and help access renovation grants, or grants for insulation and draught-proofing.

A household needs to have a total income of less than £30,000 to be eligible for a grant. In particular the fund helps those whose houses have a poor energy rating (D-G). For details of help available you can ring 03456 047 686. Or visit https://www.warmhomessuffolk.org/

The government’s Household Support Fund is being distributed by the County Council’s Local Welfare Assistance Scheme. Full information is available online, with at https://www.suffolk.gov.uk/community-and-safety/communities/healthier/suffolk-local-welfare-assistance-scheme. You can see if you are eligible and which documents you need to upload to provide evidence of this. The scheme gives direct grants of £150 per household. If you don’t have internet access, you can phone 0345 606 6067 (Suffolk County Council customer services) to ask for help.

Winter Warmth Packs
This Suffolk scheme can provide a pack of items to help households keep warm, up to £65 worth of items per household. Applicants can choose between a range of items such as hats and gloves, children’s coats, electric blanket, door and window seals, loft hatch cover, and more.
Applications have to be made through a referral from Citizens Advice or another similar agency.

For those who need expert help applying to any or all of the above schemes, don’t forget that Citizens Advice is free and confidential. Contact your local branch on 0808 2787868 or complete the form on the website https://suffolkwestcab.org.uk/contact-us/ and someone will ring you.

Surviving Winter has been running for several years and is funded by people donating their Winter Fuel Allowance to a pool, to help those in fuel poverty. Last year Suffolk Community Foundation raised over £350,000 to distribute, and this year the scheme has opened again this year.

The scheme is administered by Citizens Advice in Ipswich, and gives grants to low-income households, principally this year those who are not in receipt of the government’s Cost of Living payment. This year’s rule is that pensioners and those on means-tested benefits are not eligible. Surviving Winter are restricting the number of claimants this year due to resource limitations. Grants are given to help with heating costs, paid directly to a bank account.

To apply, you can ring the Surviving Winter Helpline on 01473 298634. Or visit https://www.citizensadviceipswich.org.uk/surviving-winter/

If you wish to donate to the Surviving Winter fund, please ring 01473 602602 or visit https://www.justgiving.com/suffolkfoundation

Cumulative Impact Policy (Licensing)

The Council’s Cumulative Impact Policy for Licensing Applications

West Suffolk Council has been reviewing its Licensing Policy document and  consulted the public recently as to whether the area affected by the Policy should be amended.

Unfortunately the Cumulative Assessment Area policy has not been renewed. Thank you to the residents who managed to complete the CIA survey. The CAA recognises that, because of the survey design, some residents were unable to take part. We submitted a response in support of the CIP on behalf of our 357 members and it seems it was counted as one response. The relevant information from West Suffolk Council is below.

Cumulative Impact Assessment areas
(Statement from West Suffolk Council)
This licensing policy only applied to Bury St Edmunds and Newmarket town centres. A CIA policy is appropriate where a high density of licensed premises or a pattern of extended opening hours is having a detrimental effect on the local community.  In these situations, a CIA policy could be used to help to restrict the number of new licensed premises or the extension of licensing hours in a specified area. This means if anyone wished to either extend the licensing hours of an existing business or open a new licensed business such as a pub, restaurant or an off-licence, the CIA is one of the ways in which they could be challenged as to the measures they would put in place to ensure their customers didn’t add to existing problems of crime, disorder, health issues or anti-social behaviour in the area.

It is important to emphasise that due to changes in the law, CIAs can only be renewed if there’s evidence that they are still required. However, the absence of a CIA does not prevent any responsible authority, or other person making representations on a new application or variation of a licence on the grounds that the premises will give rise to a detrimental cumulative impact.

We recognise that for any residents living in or nearby to Bury St Edmunds or Newmarket town centre, this is likely to be an emotive issue. We received nine responses from the public consultation. All the matters raised related to Bury St Edmunds. While it is apparent, that there are some problems of noise, disturbance and criminal damage connected with a small number of specific premises in Bury St Edmunds, this is not sufficient evidence to justify retaining a CIA policy because it is not directly connected to the volume of licensed premises and instead relates to the management of individual premises.

Moving forwards, we want to work alongside our partners, to tackle the issues that have been raised around specific premises using a range of approaches and we would like you to report these to us so we can look to undertake enforcement action as appropriate.

The best way to report these issues relating to licensed premises is to email licensing@westsuffolk.gov.uk or report to us online at https://westsuffolk-self.achieveservice.com/service/West_Suffolk_Council_enquiry_form or phone our customer services team on 01284 763233.

We will, however, keep matters under review – should evidence present itself at a later date to suggest a CIA is required, we can re-consult and reintroduce it. In the meantime, we will look to address issues reported to us through appropriate enforcement as well as use of the town centre PSPOs to directly address issues of anti-social behaviour.

Cllr Donna Higgins, Cabinet Member for Families and Communities
Cllr Ian Shipp, Cabinet Member for Leisure and Culture
Cllr Gerald Kelly, Cabinet Member for Governance, Regulatory and Environment

 

Air quality and electric chargers

Four members of our committee, including our chairman Vivien Gainsborough Foot, attended a meeting with Suffolk County Council councillors and senior officers at West Suffolk House on 2nd March to discuss electric vehicle charging and air quality issues in the Historic Grid.

You can see the presentation about the case for EV chargers here: Electric vehicles presentation
and the air quality report: Air Pollution in the CAA area

It appears that there will be no council support for EV chargers in our area. Most of the government funding is being directed at rural parts of the district. The air pollution information will be taken into account in future decisions, e.g. about pedestrianisation and enforcement of speed limits.

Electric vehicle survey

ELECTRIC VEHICLE CHARGING SURVEY REPORT – March 2022

The government are committed to ending the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles by 2030 and are encouraging car owners to switch to electric vehicles (EV). They are providing local authorities with funding to install EV infrastructure via the On-Street Residential ChargePoint Scheme and on 25th March 2022 announced Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (LEVI) pilot funding. This funding is for a charging infrastructure project that ‘supports the transition to EV use in a local area, with a particular focus on provision for those without off-street parking.’

Currently there are no plans for on-street chargers in the Grid and the CAA committee are aware that many residents do not have properties which are suitable for EV home charging. It is not permitted to run wires across the pavement, so many residents would depend on the availability of on-street chargers if they wished to own an EV in the foreseeable future. We organised an email survey of our members in January 2022 to help assess the potential demand for on-street chargers in the Grid. We asked the following questions:

  1. Do you own an electric car or intend to get one by 2030?
  2. Is your home suitable for installation of an electric charger?
  3. Would the provision of on-street chargers influence your decision to buy an electric vehicle?

The results and comments from residents can be found here: EVchargingComments2022