2.5m euros funding award to ENSURE social inclusion for vulnerable people

A new cross-border partnership project has been awarded more than 2.5 million euros of European funding (European Regional Development Fund) – as part of the Interreg VA 2Seas programme – to provide vulnerable people in our communities with ongoing assistance to access support services.

The ‘ENSURE’ project aims to break the cycle of disadvantage which can prevent vulnerable people from being socially included and ensure the inclusion of future generations. Furthermore, as the initial support is drawn from within the local community, it will be available long term and ensure individuals don’t slip back into vulnerability.

ENSURE will create a holistic model: it will test a system redesign led by front-line workers to break down existing professional silos as well as a bottom up peer-supporter approach. By acting at both levels simultaneously it aims to reach people in a timely fashion, reducing the cost to society of the bigger ‘labelled’ problems further down the line, creating less vulnerable communities, providing support where ‘everybody counts’ and enabling positive community development, moving people from a downward cycle to an upward one.

The ENSURE project brings together nine partners from France, the Netherlands, Belgium and the UK, aiming to break the cycle of disadvantage which hinders the social inclusion of vulnerable people.

The project will:

• Empower individuals to become fully participating members of their communities by developing a model to reduce and prevent vulnerability and the gap between people and public services
• Test how to bring about systemic change to ensure no-one is left behind, changing the mindsets of those responsible for providing services via newly-developed training programmes

This will lead to the creation of resilient, healthy and self-sustaining communities.

Clair Bell, Kent County Council Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Public Health said:

“We all have a shared responsibility to support the inclusion of vulnerable individuals in our communities and I very much hope that this new project will help the residents of Kent, and those of our cross-border partners, to access services more easily and provide a better experience and quality of life.”

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