Blog Post Tackling Inequalities Shining a light on poverty stigma The devastating impact of the stigma of poverty has been long established. It is known to worsen people’s mental health, leads to people not claiming all the benefits they are entitled to and increases the risk of children being absent from school. Until recently, relatively little was known about the prevalence of the stigma in […] Read more Topics: Lived experience Poverty and social exclusion September 4, 2024
Blog Post Tackling Inequalities 'Framing' not blaming I qualified as a Speech and Language Therapist in 1991 and worked with children and their families for the next 16 years. I became increasingly frustrated at the daily challenges of making a sufficient impact with the little time and resources I had. When the opportunity came to apply for the post of Flying Start […] Read more Topics: Poverty and social exclusion August 14, 2024
Blog Post Community Wellbeing A shared sense of purpose drives successful multisector collaboration – lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic During the COVID-19 pandemic, voluntary and community sector organisations became more visible than ever before. With deep roots into the communities they serve, these organisations were able to draw on local knowledge and existing infrastructure to reach those who needed help the most. A report by Locality (2020) highlighted the role of community organisations as […] Read more Topics: Community collaboration August 5, 2024
Blog Post Community Wellbeing Why Wales needs a new approach to tackling loneliness Loneliness is bad for us. It’s so detrimental that in 2023 the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared loneliness a pressing global health threat because of the growing, and startling, body of evidence demonstrating just how bad loneliness is for human health and wellbeing. Research has associated loneliness with increased risks of dementia by 50%, stroke […] Read more Topics: Community collaboration Loneliness June 13, 2024
Blog Post Community Wellbeing Environment and Net Zero The Cardiff Capital Region, Cars and Transit Oriented Development The problem Our planning and development eco-system has resulted in us building ‘all the wrong stuff in all the wrong places’ for over 50 years. Homes, hospitals, shops, offices, cinemas, leisure centres, etc are all designed and located around car access. This car based eco-system now means that many new houses are located in places […] Read more Topics: Local government Net Zero June 10, 2024
Blog Post Community Wellbeing Tackling Inequalities Hidden poverty in Welsh communities Poverty is sometimes depicted as a primarily urban phenomenon but there is financial hardship in all regions and geographies in Wales. One in five (21%) of the Welsh population are living in relative income poverty; an even greater proportion are going without essentials. Three in ten people (31%) are struggling to heat their homes, and […] Read more Topics: Poverty and social exclusion June 3, 2024
Blog Post Environment and Net Zero Tackling Inequalities Navigating farming futures How can farmers go ‘Green’ if they are in the ‘Red’? Following Brexit and the introduction of the UK Domestic Agricultural Policy, the UK farming sector faces substantial uncertainty. This blog explores some economic, social, and environmental impacts of these changes in Wales, with a particular emphasis on the emerging issue of poverty among farming […] Read more Topics: Economy Net Zero May 31, 2024
Blog Post Community Wellbeing Less resilient communities around Wales face extra challenges New research identifies additional challenges faced by communities at the margins. Following the publication of the Wales Community Assets Index and the Wales Community Resilience Index, Building Communities Trust’s (BCT) Policy Officer, Eleri Williams, explores what these linked but separate indexes tell us about the challenges faced by ‘Less Resilient’ communities in Wales and where […] Read more Topics: Community collaboration Poverty and social exclusion May 30, 2024
Blog Post Tackling Inequalities Recognising and addressing rural poverty in Wales When we think about poverty in Wales the uplands of Eryri, coastal villages in Pembrokeshire, or the rolling farmlands of Powys do not tend to be the first places that come to mind. Yet, there is growing evidence that poverty is a persistent and increasing problem for many people living in rural Wales. Researchers have […] Read more Topics: Poverty and social exclusion May 28, 2024
Blog Post Research and Impact What has devolution delivered for Wales? The day after marking its 25th birthday, the Welsh Senedd voted to increase its size by more than 50%. In 2026 the Welsh public will therefore elect 96 members in place of the current 60. Advocates of this change hailed it as a historic investment in democracy which reflected the significant strengthening of the Senedd’s […] Read more Topics: Local government Research and Impact: Impact May 24, 2024
