Category

• Promising Local Practice

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Poverty driver

• Provide benefit in-kind (experience)
• Increase income from benefits
• Increase employment income

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Keywords

• Whole System Approach
• Person-and family-centred support
• Interlinking services
• System Change
• Tackling poverty

Aim

The primary aim of the project is to offer holistic support to individuals experiencing poverty, where service providers come together to form a circle of support, ensuring that those in need do not become lost within the system.

Summary

The Inverclyde Approach is founded on the principle that alleviating poverty requires not just a single programme intervention, but a comprehensive network of interconnected support. This approach places individuals and their needs at the centre, ensuring that services are grounded in relationships. It aims to drive systemic change in service delivery by holistically assessing people’s needs and coordinating services around those needs, rather than leaving individuals facing poverty to navigate the system alone in search of adequate support. Rooted in a theory of change, this approach is currently being implemented across four distinct projects in Inverclyde, each targeting different groups in the fight against poverty.

What difference does it make?

The most significant achievement so far has been the transformation in how welfare and advice services are delivered across all projects. Service staff are now more inclined to engage directly with the community, prioritising relationship-building and assigning a named contact who can provide ongoing support. They have observed a shift away from the traditional triage approach that was often used in the past. Instead, support staff now focus on fostering relationships and offering more intensive, personalised assistance to families and individuals in need.
Additionally, the partnership between Home-Start (the third-sector organisation delivering the service), Inverclyde Council (the local authority), and Advice Services has strengthened and improved, further enhancing the collaborative effort to support those in need.

Key take-aways

• It is not a single programme intervention but system change that helps people move out of poverty.
• People living in poverty and experiencing hardship need a named contact and relationship-based support.
• Public sector organisations can take a lead role in systematic change for better service delivery to ensure that no one gets lost in the system.

 

Organisations

The Inverclyde Council Community Learning and Development Service team. Home-Start Inverclyde, and project workers from the different projects tackling poverty in the area (Early Adopter Community, Child Poverty Accelerator, Thrive Under Five project and IRISE). The collaborative works with Urban Foresight to map out the services and evaluate the implementation of the Inverclyde Approach.

Location

Inverclyde (Council area including Port Glasgow, Greenock, Gourock and the surrounding villages of Kilmacolm, Wemyss Bay and Inverkip).

Contact