St Mary’s Contact Centre Annual Report for the financial year ending 31[st] March 2023
St Mary’s Contact Centre is registered with the Charity Commission Registration number 1179955
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Principal Office Norwich Central Baptist Church Duke Street Norwich NR3 3AP Trustees Gill Duffy (Chair- retiring) John Easton (Treasurer) Rosemary Horbury Helen Bouttell (Chair- incoming) Eunice Walcott Katherine Severson Bankers CAF Bank 25 Kings Hill Avenue West Malling Kent ME19 4JQ
The trustees present their Annual Report the year ending 31[st] March 2023
Structure, Governance and Management
Our Governing Document is the “Constitution for St Mary’s Contact Centre March 2017”
Trustee Meetings take place at least 4 times a year.
The Charity Trustees are responsible for the oversight of the Contact Centre’s operations, together with the financial and legal aspects of the Charity.
We are affiliated to the National Association of Child Contact Centres who audit our policies and procedures.
Objectives
The principal objective of Contact Centre is to relieve the needs of children separated from parents and / or other family members through divorce and family breakdown in Norwich and the surrounding area in Norfolk by providing a safe, friendly and neutral environment where children of separated families can spend time with their non-residential parents and sometimes other family members.
A secondary objective is to enable the families to reach a point, where suitable, when they can arrange to meet outside of the centre and move on from needing the facility.
Activities
In order to achieve the principal objective, which is set out above, the Contact Centre is open on Saturdays, bi-weekly, for parents to meet with the children that do not live with them. The non-resident parent sits at a table with their child(ren) and they have the option of doing activities / games together. Refreshments are
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also provided. The resident parents are able to stay in a different room and also enjoy refreshments. Some parents use the centre as a venue to meet and the non-resident parent then takes their child(ren) out.
We aim to provide a range of games and activities suitable to the different ages of the children.
Families can refer themselves via NACCC to the centre but most referrals come via solicitors, CAFCASS or Children’s Services.
We employ a Contact Centre Co-ordinator whose role includes:
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Receiving applications for use of the centre and interviewing potential customers
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Overseeing the running of the centre when it is open and ensuring everything runs smoothly
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Co-ordinating the volunteers who help with the running of the centre
We have 12 volunteers. They undertake regular training across a number of areas. There are many related training modules, including Domestic Abuse, Understanding Substance Abuse, and Managing Conflict, which are delivered on a three year rolling programme, following the programme provided by NACCC.
The volunteers’ activities at the centre include the following:
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Helping set up the centre and clear things away
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Serving refreshments
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Having an oversight of what is happening in the room where the families are meeting, helping with any queries or issues
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Welcoming and interacting with the families and supporting the transition from the resident parent to the visiting parent.
Families
The Contact Centre has 12 families now in attendance. This is due to the effort of one of the trustees and the centre coordinator reaching out to make sure other centres, CAFCASS and solicitors are aware of St Mary’s after the closure during COVID.
Financial Review
The Contact Centre raises the funds which it needs to carry on its activities through grant income, application fees and the sale of refreshments.
The accounts for 1[st] January 2022 to 31[st] December 2022 are submitted with this report.
Future Plans
For the year 2023/24 plans are in place to increase awareness of the service amongst potential referrers and the public while recruiting and training more volunteers.
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