Sarah-Jane Pickering, Assistant Director of Fundraising for Home-Start UK, has written a heartfelt welcome to the autumn edition of ‘Family Matters’, Home-Start’s supporter magazine, as Home-Start launches a Cost-of-Living Crisis Appeal.

"We always hope that our Family Matters magazine is a positive read, showing the courage of parents wanting to do their best for their children, and the impact of our volunteers who enable parents to be the best parents they can be.

This edition has all the usual uplifting stories showing the difference Home-Start makes, but this edition of Family Matters is a little different...

The cost of living crisis is affecting everyone, and over the past few months we have seen the impact that rising prices and financial worries are having on the families we work with. It’s a situation we know will get even worse as temperatures drop.

I’m a fundraiser. I write funding proposals to grant-making organisations and we use that money to support families in all kinds of wonderful ways. Our proposals always have to outline why we want the money, and what the money will achieve for people. The other day I wrote a funding application that you never want to write as a fundraiser.

I was writing to try and secure funding to simply provide a warm place to take young children this winter. I was struggling to write what the impact of our project would be because all I wanted to write was how much we don’t want to have to deliver this project, how it should not need to exist. That families should not have to be facing impossible choices between heating and eating.

I’m utterly and completely heartbroken over what families with young children are facing right now. This is why we have launched our emergency Cost of Living Crisis Appeal to ensure children don’t suffer, every child deserves the best possible start in life.

If you are able to, I hope you will consider making a donation. Our support can’t wait. Childhood can’t wait".

Assistant Director of Fundraising

Home-Start UK


Donate Now


Read next - Lauren's story - My husband can't afford to come home