Home-Start Newham to close

Kay Atwal, Chief Reporter Tuesday, October 16, 2012
5:00 PM

An organisation set up in 1989 to support struggling families in the borough will close in early December due to lack of funding.

Home-Start Newham was set up in Newham since 1989, supporting families who have at least one child that is under five years old.

Its aim has always been to improve the quality of life and the life chances of disadvantaged parents and children, through recruiting and training local parents to support families in their own homes.

The organisation has worked in partnership with all the local Sure Start Programmes with a co-ordinator based in each programme to directly receive referrals and to support families in need.

Since the loss of local government funding in 2009 and the introduction of Children Centres it was funded by the Lottery, Henry Smith Trust, Lloyds TSB and Garfield Weston Foundation. Most recently it worked in partnership with Newham Music Trust to provide Music therapy to families to help them build a stronger bond through music and play.

Shadna Miah, senior co-ordinator Home-Start Newham, said: “Although there will always be new projects that appear, doing great work the fact remains that as long as there are families with under fives there will always be a need for the core work that Home-Start Newham have been doing since1989 to continue. With the loss of a service such as this families will only slide further into poverty, isolation and emotional difficulties, the whole family unit will suffer as a result of this.

“Currently we are supporting 30 families and 35 volunteers all of whom we now need to close, four part time staff are also to be made redundant.”