Charity’s warm hub to help young people
A CHARITY in the city centre has launched a warm hub for young people between the ages of 16-25 who are struggling to heat their homes over the winter period.
Bardsley Youth Project is a youth homelessness prevention and crisis relief charity that support young people under 25 who are worried about their housing situation.
Before becoming a charity in 2014, Bardsley Youth was a youth ministry for Coventry Cathedral in conjunction with Holy Trinity. The hub started in 2016 and the company closed the traditional youth work in 2019 to focus solely on the prevention and relief of homelessness.
“We saw an increase in young people becoming homeless in 2014 where regulars would spend one night sofa surfing or sleeping homeless for six weeks,” manager Simon Ree said. “We saw not enough young people were being guided by the process from other youth hostels so we started the hub to get young people where they needed to be, to any building and services they required.”
Research by Centerpoint showed that there were 122,000 16-24 year olds homeless or at risk of homelessness in 20202021, with around six in 10 saying they had to leave because of family breakdowns and arguments, resulting in being kicked out.
Rachel, who is the Communications and Fundraising worker is expecting more family breakdowns due to the cost-of-living crisis, meaning more young people over the year.
“When there’s been a family breakdown and a young person has been kicked out, they bounce around trying to find somewhere to stay and may stay with other family and friends for a few months or spend the odd night on the street. The college or friends will notice something is wrong so they bring them to us.”
The youth project started its warm hub on Thursday December 1, and is held every Monday, Tuesday and Thursday between 1-4pm; however, the service is not available between Christmas and New Year.
The charity receives donations from members of the public and local student accommodations to aid in running the hub.
“When young people move into their independent accommodation after hostel living, we give them a kitchen pack for everything you need to cook meals, hygiene packs which have sanitary products and ones that don’t and we have a clothing bank so people can grab what they want whether it’s a coat or if they need something new,” Rachel says.
Young people also have access to free hot drinks, toast and soup, as well as play Xbox and table football with others when they come in.
To help run the charity and hub, they rely on funding. The biggest funding they have received is £250,000 over three years from The National Lottery Fund.
“Our biggest bill is staffing as it’s a field that needs real knowledge which takes up 85-90% of the fund.
“After that it’s the services which are free to young people but carries a cost like our donated furniture as we have to hire a van to collect and transport and our kitchen packs as we have to buy the essentials like a microwave, kettle, toaster and so on,” Simon said.
The supply usage has increased, but it has become harder to ‘get individuals from the public to donate as people have less money, Rachel says.
‘When the funding period ends, we will be struggling but we are partnered with Coventry Building Society in Tile Hill who raise money for us and have started pushing easy fundraising,” she said.