Scottish Cabinet Secretary visits Trust funded charity

Scottish Cabinet Secretary visits Trust funded charity

Crucial and timely access to benefits and support was high on the agenda when a high-profile politician visited a charity part-funded by British Gas Energy Trust earlier this summer.

The Scottish Government’s Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Shirley-Anne Somerville, visited CHAS (Children’s Hospices Across Scotland) to engage with parents and carers about their experiences of applying for Child Disability Payment and the impact it has had on their families.

As well as caring for children, the charity supports their wider family and has a Financial Wellbeing and Energy team providing important advice for families who may be struggling financially during already traumatic periods.

During her visit, Ms Somerville spent time speaking with children and families and highlighted the availability of a dedicated fast-track process to ensure timely access to the Child Disability Payment through a Benefits Assessment under Special Rules in Scotland (BASRiS) form, which is particularly useful in urgent circumstances.

A successfully completed form can mean families aren’t waiting weeks or months for extra payments which could help them pay for transport, take part-time hours or heat their home comfortably in times of ill-health.

Abbie Durham, Financial Wellbeing and Energy Advice Team Coordinator at CHAS, said while families can be worried about such a form, it can provide much-needed support for them.

She said: “We’ve flagged that a big challenge is getting health professionals to fill out the form as nobody wants to take responsibility for it when a child has a terminal illness. A lot of people get confused with the old DS1500 form which used to mean the child is likely to pass in six months’ time.

“Some families can get a bit sceptical about the BASRiS form so it’s all about how we overcome that. Some families might see it as their child being ‘labelled’, almost as if they then know that this is what their life is expected to look like, and they aren’t ready to receive that confirmation yet.”

Abbie says the benefit has made a difference to so many families, adding: “It is a huge support. Everything changes when a child is diagnosed with a life-shortening condition or with a serious illness. They could go from being a two-parent household and both working to one of them having go give up work overnight.

“We then see a lot of families having to lose their house because they’ve just not got the same income stream. So, this payment does help them a lot to bridge that gap.

“And from an energy perspective, it’s really important because it could mean the difference between choosing to either heat their home or eat. I do find that there are more families who are putting their heating on more because they have this extra payment.

“A couple of years ago for example, we would hear that some families would have mould in their homes because they would only be heating one room – but our CHAS At Home Team are telling us that their living conditions have improved greatly since receiving this payment.”

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