Women take the lead on poverty action in Wythenshawe
Women of Wythenshawe or ‘WoW’, is a new women-led poverty action network in Manchester made up of women’s organisations who say enough is enough. WoW has been awarded £500,000 by The Smallwood Trust for an innovative three-year programme to build a women-led poverty action network from the bottom up across the Wythenshawe area.
Women will be supported to share their knowledge and experience and to identify common areas for action on gendered poverty in the neighbourhood, developing strategies for systems changes that will reduce disadvantage and make significant improvements to women’s ability to thrive. Mums Mart Savers have played an important role in establishing the network, engaging in community exchanges across Wythenshawe, while CLASS will convene the network and work closely with local support agencies to enable women's participation across at least ten different groups.
Women will be in the lead while able to call on the support of trusted local agencies when they require that help, such as bringing in key decision-makers to identify channels for influence and change. These include Executive Director of Wythenshawe Community Housing Group, Paul Seymour and Mike Kane MP.
Reflections from WoW members:
“We are so excited to be part of the Women of Wythenshawe network all the women in our group are excited about it. We have a lot that we need to share and we need to bring our voices out there.”
Ruth, Know Africa Foundation
“Our group is beautiful! We come together and make food and do activities and try to practice speaking English. WoW is a good idea for us because we need to do more activities with English speakers, but we can also share the different ideas we have – we can give each other good ideas to help each other.
Narjes, Well Women refugee support project
We have been in the Wythenshawe area for 13 years supporting carers of adults or children with learning disabilities and autism. We are really excited to be part of the WoW network because there are so many families that we work with that we want to support to have a louder voice. Many of our mums will be passionately involved in this piece of work over the next three years. It’s going to be a fantastic opportunity, also to meet with other groups in our area and become stronger by working together.
Emma, Lifted Carers Centre
Wythenshawe has had millions of pounds of regeneration funding invested over the past twenty years’ but poverty persists in many areas. WoW recognises that solutions and approaches need to be developed in partnership but from the bottom up. That means people bringing their experiences together from the individual and household level into a collective problem-solving space that is led by those directly affected.
WoW unites grassroots women around the place where they live and their common experiences, while bringing together a wide diversity of experiences and backgrounds including women of different ages, abilities, ethnicities and experiences. Wythenshawe has extremely high rates of domestic abuse (significantly higher than those for Manchester and England) and survivors are also represented.
Wherever you go in the world, poverty is gendered. As mothers, carers, low-income workers, and survivors, women shoulder an unequal burden of poverty while providing the social safety nets that hold communities together.
In the UK, it is women who have been disproportionately impacted by austerity policies, by COVID, and now by the current economic crisis (www.wbg.org.uk).
Paul Seymour said:
We are looking forward to supporting the WoW network as it evolves. We are really excited to be involved in this initiative that we believe could be the start of something transformational for women in Wythenshawe.
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Go Digital: Lessons learned and new horizons
Whitney Banyai-Becker shares reflections on the Community Savers Lottery-funded Go Digital! project, drawing on conversations with volunteer trainers and community leaders.
Of all the many changes thrust upon us by the pandemic, being able to run activities online was definitely an early imperative.
An online survey in April 2020 with Community Savers and Inner-city Exchange groups, generated the information and impetus needed to develop a programme of digital inclusion work: Community groups were clear that there was a need for grassroots support if they were going to be able to support their members and keep some activities going during the lockdown.
Thankfully, CLASS was able to access funding from the National Lottery Community Fund enabling us to recruit six Digital Inclusion Volunteers that would be paired with Digital Champions – members who were nominated by their community groups to receive train-the-trainer support.
Community-based Digital Champions were provided with a range of devices depending on need including refurbished laptops, new tablets and Mobile WIFI hubs to fully equip them for Go Digital skill-sharing sessions. Most pairs got started by January 2021 and since then, over 75 skills-sharing sessions have taken place!
What have we learned about digital inclusion?
Digital skills-sharing focused both on equipping group leaders with skills that would be useful during the pandemic such as organising online meetings, but also skills that are critical for managing a community group over the longer term, like creating files and folders and knowing where to find them again. Importantly, the sessions were tailored to priorities identified by the Digital Champions themselves.
Increased confidence has been a huge outcome from the project. One Digital Champion, Ellie shared for example how: “…I can get quite flustered; it affects your confidence really. So even with finding files and documents… if I’m having to trundle through, I just get discouraged and…it’s a vicious cycle because next time I remember how I felt and avoid it. There has been much less of that dread and because I know how to do it now, I don’t feel so down on myself or intimidated by it.”
But we have learned that building people’s digital skills has significant impacts on people’s confidence more widely. When you can suddenly arrange a Zoom call for your group – you feel pleased that you have successfully used the technology, but its more than that. You feel your confidence growing in organising meetings for the group, it creates a feeling of leadership. Digital Champion Vanessa reflected, “It gives people a wider perspective of what they can do”.
Leaders have also found that it is building their confidence to engage with professional agencies and get the responses that they need. Donna reflected that, “I’m proud of my emailing skills. I had been trying to resolve an issue with my housing, and until now I would always just telephone. I had been phoning but not really getting a response. When I received a letter, I thought, right, I am going not going to keep phoning I will reply by email. And I did… I typed up a very nice, polite, professional and confident email to her. And I got a reply right away!”
The project has also brought people from different generations to work together. One Digital Champion, Sue, shared how: “It’s brought the younger generation to us. It works both ways I think. The older generation with the younger generation – I think that’s good for society. We understand them better and they understand us. I think the whole experience has been very helpful.”
Practical lessons: What works?
- Zoom screensharing and remote-control access was very helpful with online sessions.
- Asking someone how they learn best, and how they found each session, so you can improve how you support them next time
- Highlighting similarities across software: e.g. explaining similar functions between Google Docs and Microsoft word.
- Patience, flexibility and practice is key! Specifically: going at each individual’s pace and adapting to their specific needs and interests
- Encouragement to explore by asking questions, clicking on things to find out what they do, and making mistakes… Everything can be undone!
Practical lessons: What to avoid?
- Teaching too many things in one session.
- Moving on to a new topic too quickly, people need to practice and reinforce
- Making assumptions about what people will already know: some people may not even know how to switch the device on
- Most people prefer face-to-face training when possible and progress is much quicker
Our Digital Future
Members of Community Savers groups suggest that this project will continue to have impacts over a much longer period now that groups have a trained up Digital Champion. Beyond just being able to continue the skill-sharing with a wider set of beneficiaries, the new skills mean that committee members can share roles and responsibilities more widely because people have the digital skills to carry out a more diverse set of jobs: “For the group I think it’s having more people to take on some extra roles… in the future we can divide responsibilities more as we have more knowledge of how to do certain things”, shared Julie from Mums Mart.
The project has also strengthened relationships across the Community Savers network, creating new channels for grassroots solidarity across neighbourhood and city boundaries. Since leaders have learned how to use zoom, the Community Savers Network has been holding a weekly peer support drop-in session to provide a space for community leaders to reflect, learn from, and lean on each other. Groups rotate responsibility for facilitating the discussion on a monthly basis. They have decided to keep this going beyond the lifting of restrictions.
Finally, Community Savers emerged out of a series of international exchanges with South African and Kenyan activists affiliated to the urban social movement Shack/Slum Dwellers International. Leaders are now looking at how to use their new video conferencing skills to strengthen their relationship with their tech-savvy Kenyan mentors at Muungano Wa Wanavijiji!
All in all, Go Digital! has been a real game changer for the Community Savers network. Thanks to the National Lottery Community Fund for making it all possible, and a huge well done to all the Go Digital volunteers and Digital Champions who have worked so hard to make it such a success!
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Women-led savings for financial & social wellbeing
The Money Advice Service estimates that 22% of UK adults have less than £100 in savings, yet savings are critical to wellbeing, decent living standards, and long-term family resilience. Recent research by the Resolution Foundation (2020) shows that low-income women have the least savings and are worst impacted economically by the coronavirus pandemic. At the same time, research is increasingly revealing that it is women more than men who have suffered the worst mental health impacts of the pandemic. The health and social injustices the COVID-19 crisis has exposed have been widely reported, especially the disturbing reality of a death rate twice as high in deprived compared to affluent areas. Yet the fact of these health inequalities is nothing new. It is an uncomfortable truth that it has taken a pandemic with a death toll of 149,000 and counting for this to be considered a national concern.
This is the context in which our women-led savings groups have been operating: using savings as the glue through which women can address inequality and isolation with togetherness, fun and mutual aid. Together the savings groups build financial resilience, but also confidence, skills and collective social welfare responses which have the power to unite low-income women around locally-driven solutions that work for women and families.
Three groups who particularly focus on mums, families and older women are Brinnington Savers, Mums Mart, and Sheffield Social Savers. Since January, they have been able to benefit from support from the Smallwood Trust through the National Lottery’s ‘Frontline Women’s Fund’.
Sharon Davis of Mums Mart says “the funding couldn’t have come at a better time”. While groups have adapted their activities into COVID emergency response work, most of the weekly savings meetings had been put on hold with significant impacts on members mental health and ability to save or access support. This funding followed hot on the heels of the network's Lottery-funded 'Go Digital!' project through which community group leaders have developed the ability to run activities online and support their members to increase their own digital skills for participation. Support from the Smallwood Trust gave leaders the boost to restart savings meetings either online using these new skills, or face-to-face in COVID-safe venues, as well as additional funding to be able to reach older women and families who were really struggling with isolation, or accessing essential items and financial support.
Georgie Mitchell from Sheffield Social Savers shared how one of the women they have been able to support “is a single parent who is really active with volunteering in the community even though she has a lot of challenges of her own. Her daughter broke her leg just before schools opened up again. She was in a plaster cast all the way up to her hip but the hospital said they couldn’t give her a wheelchair. To get a wheelchair she was going to have to pay £18 per week to rent one which she just couldn’t afford, and without it her daughter wasn’t going to be able to go to back to school. We were able to pay for the wheelchair for six weeks for her.”
Another group (left anonymous here) has been able to support a family fleeing a situation of domestic violence and provide crisis support to an older woman who was contemplating suicide due to months of isolation amidst long-term mental health challenges.
Sharon Davis, Mums Mart Treasurer, recounts how: "We have always had women of lots of different ages participate in Mums Mart – we’re not just mums we’re also grans, daughters and sometimes great-grannies! Some of our longest-term members are now getting quite elderly and one woman in particular called Jean is now 75 and she has no family nearby so during COVID she has completely relied on us for support. She has had a lot of health problems and been in and out of hospital for multiple tests and procedures. She has been isolating on her own at home since March 2020 – a whole year now. We have taken her to appointments and brought her home, we check in on her every week to see that she is ok and just have a bit of a chat, and we deliver her food and basic necessities regularly. She says she doesn’t know what she would have done without us during lockdown."
Donna Varley, of Brinnington Savers reported that: “The Frontline Women’s funding enabled us to relaunch our weekly savings peer support meetings again. The place we normally meet has been closed since the first lockdown and some of us have been really struggling with our mental health after being stuck at home, some of us have children with learning disabilities and other mental health challenges at home through the school closures. Although they had Education, Health and Care Plans, some were too afraid to go to school even though they would have been allowed.
Being able to meet meant we could also do taster sessions on tablets with some of our members who are at home without internet or digital skills. We’ve been able to buy three tablets and two mobile wifi devices for three of our Over-50s members who developed the confidence and interest to use one independently. One of our members, Christine, doesn’t even own a mobile phone. Christine has enjoyed it so much she has just had BT internet installed at home."
We all want to say a big thank-you to the Smallwood Trust and the National Lottery Community Fund. But also: Community Savers groups are always looking for new communities to do learning exchanges with if you want to find out more. Feel free to contact one of the groups featured on our home page directly to set up an exchange, or contact CLASS for assistance.
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What is the city but the people?
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Networks get stronger despite coronavirus isolation
In the third of a series of articles looking at the experiences of some of our members during the pandemic, Rowena Harding asks Sharon Davis about the community response in Wythenshawe.
Wythenshawe is a connected community. It’s got numerous community centres, healthy cooking and food growing projects, a good neighbours scheme, and Mums Mart – a women-led community association running markets, lunch clubs and a savings scheme. So what has happened to the people who use and need those services as the coronavirus closed public spaces, restricted community meetings and forced people indoors to isolate? The community heroes who had been running those services are still there - they’re just finding new ways to reach out and connect.
Take Sharon Davis. She’s been the driving force behind the Mums Mart savings scheme in Wythenshawe and supported the setting up of new women-led savings groups in Brinnington, Hulme and Miles Platting. Mums Mart’s savings group meets in a community location, where a weekly lunch is also available. It’s through these activities that Sharon has come to know people in the area who may need help now the virus has forced them behind doors.
“Since lockdown, we have been identifying where people live and taking the food we get donated from Marks and Spencers,” Sharon explains. The group was able to access emergency community funding, so they had money to spend on essential items that weren’t donated.
“I think it’s been useful that we had our group,” Sharon said. “We’ve got phone numbers [for the savings groups members], and I speak to them often. We’ve got a few Facebook messenger groups and if anything goes wrong they call me. We have had people connecting with us on messenger, or I’ll see something on Facebook,” Sharon explains of a chance posting that led her to get dog food for a veteran with underlying health issues who shouldn’t be going to the shops.
She’s also been able to get nappies for parents who can’t go out and items for people who simply can’t afford it. Those in the community who lost jobs due to virus-related layoffs still have to wait six weeks for money to come through, and those who have been furloughed may be getting 80% of their salary paid by the government, but as Sharon points out, they still have 100% of bills to pay.
We hear the phrase “self isolating” so much in the COVID era, but Sharon says many can’t imagine the reality of isolation that people are going through. She talks of a woman in her nineties living alone, who’d love to give her a hug; a man in his eighties with Parkinsons who had not left his house for 14 weeks; and a family with three children in a middle flat, all at home together and not going outside. When Sharon went to drop off some food to one woman, she was told to keep it for someone who needed it more. This woman told her that what she was really struggling with was loneliness.
Sharon realised there’s also the potential benefit of having the large community space where they used to meet. She’s been doing refurb on the place while it’s been quiet, but when she heard this woman’s loneliness Sharon told her there’s plenty of space for her to come in and have a brew from a distance. As the lockdown begins to lift, the Mums Mart group will try and have a distanced meeting so they can reconnect in person.
It’s not just Sharon that is helping the community get what they need. Thanks to the initiative of another connected community member, Sharon now has a drop off point for bulk items that is also passed onto residents in that location. Sharon’s daughter Sian also joins her for the big shop and they store items to reduce the amount of times they need to go to the shops. Everyone is looking after each other, Sharon says. “In my opinion, people are looking out for their neighbours much more. Let’s hope it stays.”
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What is the city but the people?
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