Amplifying the voices of people in poverty

What is a Poverty Truth Commission?

Poverty Truth Commissions seek to answer the question ‘what if people who struggled against poverty were involved in making decisions about tackling it?’

The members (or commissioners) for each Commission come from two groups of people. Around half are people with a lived experience of the struggle against poverty. The other half are decision-makers and influencers within the city or region. Collectively they work to understand the underlying issues and causes of poverty and explore creative ways of addressing them.

PTN What is a Commission film v2.mp4 from Poverty Truth Network on Vimeo.

 

Why South Lakeland?

There are pockets of poverty right across South Lakeland in the towns and in the rural areas, including a shocking percentage of children living in poverty. The disparity between different areas is also shocking: life expectancy in Staveley is 16 years more than life expectancy in the most deprived area of Kendal, and the disparity in ‘healthy life expectancy’ is even starker.

In October 2020 South Lakeland District Council declared a Poverty Emergency and soon after that a group of local partners came together to work towards establishing a Poverty Truth Commission – to find out the real issues of people at the sharp end of poverty and use their experience to change things for the better.

 

How does it work?

The first South Lakes Poverty Truth Commission took just over two years.

The first year was about meeting and listening to people in poverty and helping them develop the confidence (where needed) to share their stories, at first in small groups and eventually at a public launch meeting. Those first Community Commissioners then identified who they would like to talk to – in local government and other organisations – and those people were among those invited to a public meeting on 13 October 2023 in Windermere to hear the presentations.

Through the second year of the project we met monthly as a Full Commission 2024 and, in parallel, for the second half of that year, as four Working Groups on:

• Poverty and Community Hubs
• Poverty and Mental Health
• Poverty and Domestic Abuse and Violence
• Poverty and Person-Centred Services

Commissioners worked on practical steps that can be taken now, in South Lakeland, to improve the experience of people living in, or on the edge of, poverty, including speaking to key decision-makers and developing reports, training and guidance on poverty and related issues.

In October 2024 we held our second public event in Windermere, Nothing Without Us, sharing some of the work we have been doing over the past year and how we hoped to continue working closely with Westmorland & Furness Council and other partners in the future, past this life of this current Commission. At the end of the year we shared the work we had done with all our stakeholders, supporters and partners, including the Council. You can access the SL PTC Knowledge Bank here

All the films that we made to capture how we worked and what we talked about are available on the Cumbria CVS YouTube channel in the SL PTC playlist

You can also get a feel for our PTC by visiting our Facebook page here

 

What now?

For general enquiries about South Lakes PTC, please email southlakesptc@cumbriacvs.org.uk

Three of our Working Groups are continuing to work closely with Westmorland & Furness Council and happy to meet/work with others who are interested in including the voice of lived experience in the improvement of services in the South Lakes. They can be contacted as follows:

Poverty & Person-Centred Services Working Group – Jayne Harty
Jayne.Harty@WestmorlandandFurness.gov.uk

Poverty & Community Hubs Working Group – Kelly Alty
Kelly.Alty@westmorlandandfurness.gov.uk

Poverty & Mental Health Working Group – Heather Thompson
heather.thompson110@nhs.net

A group of our Commissioners are also working with Cumbria Development Education Centre until March 2025 to develop and deliver poverty proofing and poverty awareness training for the Council and their partners. For more information about this work, and how to book training for your organisation once it is complete, please contact:

Laura Goad, laura@cdec.org.uk

 

What next?

Cumbria CVS is now putting together a proposal to attract funding for a second South Lakes Poverty Truth Commission, enabling a new cohort of Civic and Community Commissioners to work on the issues that matter most to them.

For more information about this proposal, please contact CCVS Westmorland & Furness District Manager, Gabi Lipska, gabriela.lipska@cumbriacvs.org.uk

 

What is CVS’ role in the project?

We are one of the founding members of the first PTC Support Group and the fundholders for the first PTC and the ongoing PTC Poverty Training work to March 2025.

The project to date has been largely funded by Westmorland & Furness Council, with additional funding from NHS Population Health, the National Lottery Community Fund and the Poverty Truth Network.