LATEST NEWS: LETTING WITH CONFIDENCE

If you are a landlord with a property in Waverley, we would like to invite you to complete our survey https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/6RYBD7R

We help our clients and people in Waverley by campaigning on their behalf. Our aim is to improve the policies and practices which affect people’s lives, creating a fairer society.

Our campaigns are based on sound research and reflect those issues which are having the biggest effect on our clients locally. We then campaign on these to bring about change and support national campaigns by Citizens Advice where these are relevant to our clients and people in Waverley.

We are currently focusing on three main areas:

1. Housing and Homelessness

Many of our clients have housing problems particularly with privately rented accommodation. We also have many clients who have become homeless and need support in finding accommodation. We are working with Waverley Borough Council on many of these issues to bring about changes in policy and are supporting the national campaign to improve protection for tenants in the private rented sector.

2. Health and Social Care

We are aiming to build relationships with Clinical Commissioning Groups and GPs to campaign on health & social care issues. One issue we will be focussing on is the impact of the Care Act 2014 which comes into force in April 2015 and imposes new obligations on local authorities. We are also part of Healthwatch Surrey, the health and social care consumer champion. We share what our clients tell us about their experiences with Healthwatch and combine our campaigning skills with them to support their objectives.

3. Welfare Reform

Reform of the system of welfare benefits arising from the need to reduce public expenditure has caused many problems for our clients, for example with the introduction of Employment and Support Allowance (ESA) for people who are unable to work because they are ill or have a disability, and the increased use of sanctions for those claiming Jobseeker’s Allowance. We have worked with the Department for Work and Pensions locally on these issues and supported the national Citizens Advice ‘Make ESA Fit for Work’ campaign.

The introduction of Universal Credit over the next few years will also mean that we will need to help clients understand this new benefit and make claims online. An example of local research is our report ‘Claiming with Confidence’ where we worked with other local Citizens Advice bureaux in Surrey to show the barriers to claiming Universal Credit online.

Spreading the word

We keep local MPs and Councillors briefed on our activities so they know how we are helping their constituents. We contribute regular articles to Farnham Herald and The Challenger some of which can be found on our Media page, maintain a lively blog, and are active on Twitter @WaverleyCAB. We also issue regular press releases to the local media on topical issues and to support our campaigns.

Get involved

If you would like to know more about how you can get involved in our research and campaign work, please visit volunteering opportunities.