NEW £300 Cost of Living payments are landing in 2025 – thanks to the Department for Work and Pensions ( DWP ). In the Labour Party Budget, the UK government announced that they will be extending the Household Support Fund for six months.
This grant scheme runs from 1 OCtober 2024 to 30 March 2025, and is funded by central government. Shropshire Council has been given a further grant of £2.1 million from the scheme. This money is to help people in Shropshire to meet immediate needs and help those who are struggling to afford household essentials including energy and water bills, food, and wider essentials.
Shropshire Council and partner organisations are continuing to work together to ensure that people most in need are supported with this funding, in line with guidance set out by the government. The fund is intended to cover a wide range of low-income households in need, including families with children of all ages, pensioners, unpaid carers, care leavers and disabled people, larger families, single-person households, and those struggling with one-off financial shocks or unforeseen events.
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The fund will be delivered through both targeted and application-based support to ensure help is available to a wide range of vulnerable households in most need with the cost of essentials. As part of the fund, the local authority in the West Midlands is offering a £300 targeted payment to pensioner households on low incomes who are in receipt of council tax support and/or housing benefit but not pension credit (criteria applies).
It also adds online: “The fund will continue to provide free school meals holiday vouchers during the remaining 2024/25 academic year. For children in receipt of eligible benefits-related FSM on roll in Shropshire schools and children in receipt of 24U funding and Early Years Pupil Premium in early years settings.”