2021-03-31-accounts

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BEAM

(A company limited by guarantee)

Report and financial statements for the year ended 31[st] March 2021.

Charity number: 1097322 Company Number: 4495170

Page 3. Reference and administrative information

Page 4. Objects

Page 6. The focus of Beam’s work

Page 7. Covid-19 Page 8. Project Details

Page 11. Statement of financial activities and notes

The Management Committee presents its directors’ rep0rt and audited financial statements for the year ended 31[st] march 2021.

Reference and administrative information

Charity Name Beam Staffs Charity registration number 1097322 Company registration number 4495170 Registered office and operational address Unit No 1 The Mills Mill Street Stafford ST16 2QZ Management Committee Mr Ian Mason Chair Mr David Moreton Honorary Secretary Mr David Bailey Mr Michael Creek Mr Stephen Fletcher Mrs Hayley Fletcher Mr Simon Mountford

Secretary

Mr Mike Howell

Staff Team

Mr Mike Howell Chief Officer Ms Nadina Binns Senior Welfare Benefits Advice Officer Ms Lynsey Pearce Welfare benefits Advisor Left in January 2020 Mrs Karin Hall Senior employability officer Mrs Janine Davies Mental Health and Wellbeing Officer Joined in July 2020 Mr Desmond Brumley Health Support Worker Joined in October 2020 Ms Julieanne Roberts Welfare benefits Advisor Joined in March 2021

Financial Inspector Mr Malcolm Kidd Bankers Unity Trust Bank Nine Brindleyplace Birmingham B1 2HB

Accountant Mrs Nadia Coupland

OBJECTS

The objects of the Society as set out in the memorandum of association are: -

The relief of people with a learning disability, in particular by the provision of help and support for them and for their families, dependants and carers, for the public benefit.
To provide or assist in the provision of facilities for the recreation or other leisure time occupation for people who have need thereof by reason of learning disability with the object of improving their condition of life.

“Learning disability” means any developmental disability of the mind and any associated condition howsoever caused and whether mild, moderate or severe.

In order to attain its objects but not for any other purpose the society may (but need not):

Increase public awareness and understanding of the abilities of people with a learning disability, their problems and needs and those of their families, dependents and carers in order to assist their integration into society.
Encourage mutual help and co-operation between families, dependants and carers of people with learning disabilities (particularly within the geographical vicinity of the society) and also between them and other agencies and individual who work for them.
Co-operate with other charities, voluntary bodies and statutory authorities operating in furtherance of the objects of the Society or of similar charitable objects and exchange information and advice with them.
Raise funds and ask for and receive contributions (including subscriptions, legacies, grants and other gifts) provided that in raising funds the Society shall not undertake and permanent activities of a trading nature except those allowed by charity law.
Invest the money of the Society not immediately required for its purposes in or upon such investments, securities or properties as may be thought fit.
Employ such staff as are necessary for the proper pursuit of the objects upon such terms as to remuneration and otherwise as the Executive Committee shall decide provided that no paid member of staff shall be a member of the Executive Committee.
Appoint and constitute an advisory committee of people with a learning disability and such other advisory committees as the Executive Committee shall think fit.

Borrow or raise money in such manner and upon such terms as the Society shall think fit and may, for the purposes of securing any debt or other obligation of the Society, mortgage or charge all or part of the property of the Society.
Buy, take on lease or in exchange any building and/or land and maintain and equip such buildings and/or land for use and sell, lease or otherwise dispose of them subject to complying with such conditions and obtaining such consents as may be required by charity law
Undertake or accept any trusts or obligations.
Do all such other lawful things as shall further the attainment of the objects of the Society

Objectives

The objectives of the charity are to make sure that people with a learning disability living in Stafford and South Staffordshire have the same opportunity as everyone else to be a fully inclusive member of their community as they possibly can.

We aim to reduce a person’s potential for being marginalised and discriminated against because they have a disability.
We aim to see our clients are fairly and equitably represented in areas of life and living that the non-disabled community will have a better chance of achieving in. For example, this could be employment, housing, personal health, benefits entitlement, social life and education.

Ensuring our work delivers its aims

We will consult with our users about the things we plan to do and the projects we plan to deliver. They will tell us what they think we need to do. Each project will have its own set of outcomes, outputs or results that are usually required for funding purposes. These activities are regularly reviewed by the Management Committee to ensure that our funded activities are consistent with our aims. Also, Trustees will consider our forward plans to ensure that the same tie up is present going forward as it does for past achievements, therefore ensuring that planned activities contribute to the agreed aims and objectives.

The focus of our work

The main objectives for the year continued to be those mentioned above. The strategies that we have used to achieve these objectives were: -

In response to the Social Welfare legislation to ensure that our clients get the support they need in being able to respond to the changes to their benefits regime.
For many complex reasons our clients are seriously underrepresented in being able to find employment. We have helped many people with learning disabilities get closer to the job market.
Beam has, with the employability program, introduced a specific service for people who have a mental health issues they need support with.
All beam staff have attended training courses on many different aspects of good practice in service delivery and how the job changes with the introduction of new legislation.
We have, as much as possible, worked in partnership with likeminded organisations as a means of accessing the widest range of services that can be linked to the needs of our clients.

How our activities deliver public benefit

Our main activities and who we support are described below. All our charitable activities focus on the needs of people with learning disabilities and are undertaken to further our charitable purposes for the public benefit.

Our services, who used them and how did they benefit?

The number of people with a learning disability in the area beam works in is far in excess of the number of people we support. There are no accurate statistics that show how many people live in Stafford and South Staffordshire who have a learning disability; the best we have is an estimate that 2.1% of the population fall into this category. This means that in Stafford Borough alone 2,803 individuals are potential clients, a number far beyond the total amount of people we could support during a year.

Covid – 19 and how Beam responded

Beam kept all of its programmes active during the pandemic, with no project delivery members of staff being furloughed. In some cases, beam was able to add to the services being provided. The year began with all staff working from home, with an added consideration of what Beam could do during the early phases of the pandemic to support those people who were at the greatest risk.

A shopping service was provided for our more vulnerable clients during the first few months of the pandemic; in doing this we provided shopping training for clients as a means of encouraging them to do this for themselves in a safe way. It was important that we helped them to be able to understand how they should respond to the covid precautions put in place in shops and supermarkets.
The pandemic meant that our clients were more reliant on making phone calls to keep in touch with friends and families. Beam was able to support clients with this by giving them £10 towards the cost of additional air time.
Beam was fortunate to received a grant of £3,060 from the Government £750m third sector emergency fund (administered by The Lottery) towards the cost of providing a training course for clients which explained what covid is, what the symptoms are and things they can do to stay safe. The was delivered in the summer months when we were able to open the office.
The office was closed from April 2020 onwards as part of the first lockdown and reopened within government guidelines during the summer. The second lockdown closed the office again in November. During the occasions when the office was able to open Beam was careful to ensure that our covid policy, risk assessment and procedure has been kept up to date and that all our staff and visitors were kept as safe as possible. We are pleased to comment that we had no covid infections associated with the office.
Working from home has become a regular feature at Beam and is a practice which is encouraged. Staff have learnt much about the benefits of this practice and understand when its appropriate when to work from home and those things that you can do better at home. It’s a practice that will continue particularly when events and activities in the office mean increased numbers and this makes the office a safer place.

Give me some credit

Beam’s benefits advice service continued throughout the year in its normal high demand and high paced style. This project is Reaching Communities funded until July 2023.

As the pandemic has created higher rates of unemployment this means that more people are making benefits claims and given that 2.1 % of the population have a learning disability this has created a heightened level of demand. The program continues to support people with learning disabilities who need support with Personal Independence claims, Employment Support Allowance and opening and maintaining Universal Credits accounts. Beam will help people with benefits and applications which are linked to these and over the year we have supported people with attendance allowance, tax credits, housing benefit, council tax, social prescribing referrals, severe disability premium and in some cases local authority referrals.

The pandemic has created changes in delivery methods through the introduction of telephone assessments. Conversely the plus side to this is that many entitlements were extended.

Lynsey Pearce left Beam in January 2021 to be ably replaced by Julieanne Roberts.

Health Support

During the year Beam was able to start a program of support that has been a longstanding ambition. It has long been a reality that people with learning disabilities will die earlier than those without and that these deaths are easily avoidable with the right kind of support. It was of great concern to Beam that the covid pandemic would accentuate this situation and indeed time proved this to be the case.

Therefore, Beam made a successful application to Reaching Communities to fund a Health Support Worker for a six-month period. In October 2020 Beam was joined by Des Brumley to fill this role.

Building Better Opportunities

Unfortunately, many people lost their jobs during pandemic. Therefore, the service provided by Building Better Opportunities became all the more important.

After looking at the needs of program participants we found that some 80% of these had a mental health concern that affected their ability to search for and find employment. It was in July 2020 when Janine Davies joined Beam as the Mental Health and Wellbeing Support Worker on the Building Better Opportunities program. Janine had the specific role of finding appropriate support for clients with Mental Health concerns and to develop a route to wellbeing plan for them.

During the year we were also extremely please to find that the program was given its third funding extension and will now complete in June 2023. Beam was pleased to play

host to a number of Building Better Opportunities events during the year, “coffee time” and “just the job” are examples of this.

Financial Review

Beam has faced a similar funding landscape that many other voluntary and community groups have. The sector is seeing the continued reduction of funding being made available from grant giving trusts and government grants. In addition, we have seen more groups bidding for a smaller pot therefore making the chance of a successful bid being far less than it ever has been before. We have see the amount of money available from Government contracts to be more than before but even that now is beginning to decline.

Beam accepts the principle that it needs to improve its ability to successfully bid into the tender system and address the issue that the tender process works more in favour of the larger groups than the smaller ones (like beam). Also, we accept the view that beam needs to develop ways to generate its own trading income as part of the strategy to financially survive. We see the financial future as one where you should spread your income sources across a range of activities thus avoiding the “all your eggs in one basket” situation. We want to avoid the scenario where if funding from one source either is withdrawn or comes to an end then we will have a problem rather than a crisis.

The Mills – the new office

Like many others Covid -19 meant that on April 1[st] the office was closed. Beam’s plan for the office was to invite like-minded partner organisations to join us as part of our strategy to generate additional income. Beam wasn’t able to implement this until the government allowed us to start to reopening. Therefore, beam has no other option than to wait until conditions are in place to start working on our plans for the new office.

Investment Policy

Prior to being in receipt of the Trust Fund beam had no policy on where to invest its reserves. During the year our bank, similar to many other banks, stopped paying interest on deposit accounts.

Principle Funding Sources

Beam’s principal funding sources continues to be from Reaching Communities and Building Better Opportunities. These services will continue to run until July 2023 and June 2023 respectively and therefore provide a reasonable level of core funding continuity to Beam.

Reserves Policy

Beams trustees have reviewed their reserves policy during the year and made the following allocations to designated funds.

A designated fund of £97, 959 to cover the lease costs and running costs on its existing premises. This fund also covers redundancy costs for all staff in the event of an emergency unexpected shutdown.
A designated fund of £138,600 that provides twelve months running costs as a contingency against an unexpected loss of core funding.

Future Plans

Having established and furnished the office to provide an excellent working environment for staff and a venue that clients will find comfortable, beam’s plans are now focused around: -

Longer term financial stability to include a reduction in grant dependency and a development of self-generated income
Ensuring the services we provide are those our clients require.
Looking at the viability of new services and enterprises
Developing staff skills.
Considering our status as a charity
Attracting more trustees.

Governing document

Beam’s governing documents comprise of memorandum of Association and Articles of Association.

Recruitment and appointment of the directors

The business plan has a section on how and when the trustees will review its membership, carryout a skills analysis and recruit members who have the skills to support the service.

Organisational Structure

Beam is a Registered Charity and a Company Limited by Guarantee

Statement of Financial Activities for the year ended 31 March 2021 Section A Income and expenditure

	N o t e	Unrestricted Funds £	Restricted Income Funds £	Endowment Funds £	Total Funds £	Prior year funds £
Income
Donations and legacies		210			210	25,277
Charitable activities	1		118,271		118,271	112,596
Other Trading Activities		828			828	4,875
Investments		149			149	1,163
Separate Material item of income
Covid support funding	2		37,927		37,927
Other		65			65	269
Total		1,252	156,198		157,450	144,180

Expenditure
Raising funds		-	-	-	-	-
Charitable funds	3		162,278		162,278	151,955
Separate material expense item
Other
Total					162,278	151,955

Net income for reporting period					157,450	144,180
Tax Payable
Net Income after tax					157,450	144,180
Net gains on investments
Net Income					157,450	144,180
Extraordinary Items
Transfer between funds


Net Movement in Funds	4				(4,828)	(7,775)
Reconciliation of funds
Total funds brought forward
Total funds carried forward					277,649	282,477

Statement of Financial Activities for the year ended 31 March 2019 Section B Balance Sheet

	N o t e	Total Funds £	Prior year funds £
Fixed Assets
Intangible assets
Tangible assets		1,516	3,255
Heritage assets
Investments
Total Fixed Assets		1,516	3,255

Current Assets
Creditors		2,968	2,643
Debtors		1,112	1,397
Investments
Cash at bank & in hand		277,989	282,468
Total Current Assets	5 6	277,649	282,477

Notes to the accounts

The income of £118,271 represents monies received from Beam’s two primary programmes. £56, 000 from Building Better Opportunities to support the employability service and £62,271 from the Reaching Communities benefits project.
Beam was able to secure additional funding to support its clients during the ongoing covid outbreak; a total of £37,927. This is represented by £30,185 from Staffordshire Community Foundation to fund the health support service, £3,060 from Reaching Communities to cover the cost of covid awareness courses, £1,500 from Staffordshire County Council to help meet additional costs incurred due the covid pandemic, £750 from the Tesco Charitable fund to pass onto clients to meet additional phone costs, and £875 from Staffordshire County Council to meet additional cleaning costs.
Expenditure for the year is recorded at £162,278. Increases in expenditure were seen in salaries and Rental charges. Salaries were up because of the appointment of the health support worker and cleaner. Rental increases can be attributed to the costs associated with the new office location.
A deficit of £4,828 has been recorded for the year, leaving total funds of £277,649 to be carried forward.
Beam’s trustees have allocated designated funds in two ways: -
£97,959 is allocated to ensuring that accommodation costs are covered for the remainder of the lease. This fund also covers the payment of redundancy costs in the event of an unexpected closedown.
£138,600 is allocated to cover operating costs for one year in the event of funding being withdrawn.
£20,523 has been moved from free reserves to the designated funds described above. Free reserves are now reduced to £41,090.

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