Friends For Families Sevenoaks

Friends For Families is a unique small charity working in the Sevenoaks and Dartford Districts to help families facing financial hardship.

The charity was set up in 2018 to provide direct, practical assistance to people who have been identified by Children’s Services as needing help which can’t be provided by statutory agencies: once they’ve received a referral from Children’s Services Friends For Families step in to help to fill that gap.

From the beginning they have provided beds for children and other basic furniture, baby essentials, food, clothing and shoes for struggling families. But they do much more than this and are always willing to consider a genuine need that Children’s Services bring to them: because they are a small local charity they can be very flexible and responsive (for example during the first lockdown they supplied a mini food bank for Children’s Services’ most vulnerable families), and they are expanding the range of things they will help with to meet the increasing challenges faced by families living in poverty.

One example is that they have recently begun providing support with energy bills for families facing a choice between heating and eating. Their chair and co-founder, Shona Campbell, said ‘we feel that children who have had a good night’s sleep and have a full tummy will have more chance to thrive: the thought of children going to school hungry and cold isn’t acceptable, and we want to do what we can to help.’

One unique feature of this local charity is that they have no paid staff but are all volunteers, and they have no premises either, so their overheads are tiny. Shona said ‘we rely on the support of our wonderful local community to do our work, and it’s important to know that your donations will be spent on helping people in need and not on overheads.’

This small group of local women are giving their time and energy to help struggling local families, and they are grateful for every donation. If you’d like to know more about them, please visit their website Friends for Families or their Facebook page Friendsforfamilies – Home | Facebook or email [email protected] to  get in touch with them, they’d love to hear from you!

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