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2024-09-19-accounts

Southwark

Annual Report

2024-2025

Registered Charity 1188121

Grief Matters Southwark - Annual Report

CONTENTS

Pages
INTRODUCTION 2
LEGAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION 3
REPORT OF THE TRUSTEES 24/25 4
STATEMENT OF FINANCIAL ACTIVITIES 13

LEGAL AND ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION

STRUCTURE, GOVERNANCE AND MANAGEMENT GOVERNING DOCUMENT

The charity is controlled by its governing document, Constitution of a Charitable Incorporated Organisation whose only voting members are its charity trustees. Registered company number 1188121

The Trustees present their report with the financial statements of the charity for the year ended 31 March 2025.

Welcome to our Annual Report of 2024-2025.

Grief Matters Southwark would like to say thank you to all the staff including volunteers who are the life blood of this small charity and to all that have supported Grief Matters Southwark (GMS) in past. It is down to the dedication of our volunteers, management and clinical teams, and the support of our donors/funders that Grief Matters Southwark is growing and developing whilst maintaining its first-class support service for those bereaved in the London Borough of Southwark.

The placement training scheme for counselling students at diploma level started last year has been successful and we are able to employ some more students over the last year.

Thanks to our Patron, Jo Brand donations we were able to cover all of our operations overheads and were able to support all of the clients that needed our support.

Since the pandemic we have continued to work remotely, offering both telephone counselling and video conferencing. As our virtual office provides an affordable and effective way for us at GMS counselling services to work we will be continuing with remote counselling for the time being until the organisation grows.

Our clinical team has remained the same as last year. The trainee placement scheme continues to provide an important resource for Grief Matters Southwark and for the students that participate. We continue to only take 4[th] year diploma students unless the student has a specialism in bereavement issues or work.

We as always very much centred on being a community-based team in Southwark and continue to be supported by Jo Brand, Community Southwark, and the Southwark Wellbeing Hub.

Grief Matters Southwark remains an inclusive organisation working with diverse groups and employing a diverse team of staff including Board Members. We are committed to excellent standards in social inclusion, togetherness, anti-racism and equality.

We believe that it is our mission, vision and values that keep us safe and secure in our work and as we look towards the future with an aim to continuing to commit to our core beliefs.

Our Mission is to provide a first-class bereavement counselling service to the people of Southwark.

Our vision is that all residents in the London Borough of Southwark & Lambeth who are bereaved can access our specialised counselling service.

Our values are compassion-focused, non-judgemental, supportive and comforting. We place a high onus on respecting diversity and employ a workforce of staff that reflect the diversity of the community of Southwark.

Our six-core values ReCIPE are:

TRUSTEES : Tym Soper (Chair of Board of Trustees), Chorouk El-Adib (Secretary of the Board of Trustees), Lester Thompson, Vikki Moorhouse, Treasurer role (currently being advertised).

OUR OBJECTIVES : To provide low-cost bereavement counselling service in Southwark and to relieve the mental and physical distress of people suffering from bereavement or loss, who reside in Southwark or the surrounding areas, by providing bereavement counselling and support in the community.

OUR HISTORY

Grief Matters Southwark was established as a registered charity on 21 February 2020. Grief Matters Southwark Bereavement Service is a specialist service that prioritises complex bereavement in adults. For detailed information see our website https://GriefMattersSouthwark.com

Our team of counsellors are London based and are looking to provide support for bereaved people. Often our volunteers have had their own difficult experiences of grief and want to give back to organisation that support bereaved people due to their own life experiences.

In the past our objectives have been to support the promotion of charitable purposes for the benefit of the community within the London

Borough of Southwark. However, we have reviewed this borough specific criteria and are likely to expand our work reaching out to bordering boroughs such as London Borough of Lambeth, City of Westminster, Croydon, Lewisham, Tower Hamlets when needed.

Grief Matters Southwark is headed by the Board of Trustees, who together are responsible for the management of the organisation.

Report of the Chair 2024-2025

I am delighted to have been offered the position of Chair in the fourth year of the establishment of Grief Matters Southwark and am looking forward to working for the charity in its fifth operational year. I hope to support and develop this small charity into a well-financed and effective organisation.

We continue to provide a remote service to clients and this helps keep down costs. We could not afford to survive without being a remote service. However, if finances improve we will be looking for affordable premises in the future. As mentioned before Grief Matters Southwark has developed and is now able to take on new volunteer counsellors for training placements and has managed to stay a functional organisation e through difficult times.

I am pleased to join as Chair a socially inclusive organisation whose staff (mostly unpaid volunteers) work tirelessly to keep the charity going. and happy to see that our team of staff and clientele continue to advocate for diversity and social inclusion and that it remains a priority in our work. Five years of hard work has paid off and we are still afloat thanks to the generous donations from clients and our honourable patron, Jo Brand. It is due to financial donations and awards that our charity is still running and we are able to offer our services to the most marginalised of clients in the local area. We endeavour to keep up our good work and continue to focus on maintaining high standards.

Grief Matters Southwark is open for counselling from Monday to Friday. Ours fees remain low and we hope to continue to offer a low-cost service in the future.

Yours sincerely

Tym, Soper, Chair of the Board of Trustees

Accessing Our Services

Clients are able to self-refer to our services via our website or will be referred by relevant agencies. These external agencies are set out in our original business plan.

Funding

We have now recruited a new volunteer fundraiser and are looking to apply for more grants and put on more fundraising events. The implementation of new counselling students will help the charity to profit and can therefore be thought of fundraising in that respect. Thanks to The Albert Trust grant we received we were able to provide free counselling for 22 clients

Staffing and Recruitment

Our current team include 1 director, 1 counselling manager, 1 clinical assessor, a supervisor as well as team of counsellors. Our clinical team comprises 5 part-time staff members. All staff are volunteers (with the exception of consultant/freelance roles. These paid roles include both counselling manager and supervisors). The director and administrative are not paid. Counsellors are given more than 3 clients a week. All our counsellors must have a current DBS check before they start working as a counsellor and they must have completed the GMS Safeguarding online training that we have produced. We currently employ 2 administrative volunteers who have a wide range of knowledge including specialisms in HR and social marketing and research.

Client Demographics

All clients are from the London Borough of Southwark and include:

Trustees

We have four Trustees. Tym Soper - Chair of the Board of Trustees, Chorouk El-Adib - Secretary of the Board of Trustees, Lester Thompson – Trustee, Vikki Moorhouse – Trustee. We are currently looking for 2 new trustees.

The Board of Trustees meet several times a year and contribute to the strategic development of the organisation. All expenses over £50 are overseen and approved of by the Board of Trustees.

It is the intention of the Board of Trustees to review staff pay annually taking into account Local Government Pay Settlements, inflation and the current state of affairs of the organisation. Funding will be focused on paying staff in the years ahead. We hope to be able all staff members eventually if we secure enough funding including the director, administrators and counsellors.

Overheads and Spending

This is the fourth year since we have been working as a charity and we continue to operate on a low budget due to not having high overheads. We currently have no rent to pay for premises as we work remotely. This is only possible because of the dedication of the staff and volunteers that contribute their time and skills to the cause.

Volunteers are the life blood of this organisation. We currently have 6 volunteers, 3 freelancers and 5 trustees working for the charity. Our clientele statistics have only grown slightly over the last year, but we persevere and hope to add more clients to the waiting list shortly.

FINANCIAL INFORMATION FOR 2024-2025

GMS ACCOUNT BALANCE SHEET April 2024 TO April 2025

Income carried over from £ ___________ Income Expenditure Restricted Funds £0.00 £0.00 Unrestricted Funds £425.00 £1,193.46 ________________ Expenditure Outgoings Supervision £ 150.00 Unrestricted Telephone & internet Bills £ 70.20 Unrestricted Insurance £ 118.27 Unrestricted Staff Costs £ 400.00 Unrestricted ICO £ 35.00 Unrestricted Word Press £ 120.00 Unrestricted Staff Training £ 299.99 Unrestricted TOTAL £1,193.46 Income Grants and donations £ 25.00 Unrestricted Trading Unrestricted (paying clients) £ 420.00 Total £445.00 Total £445.00

Code of Ethics

Grief Matters Southwark adheres to the requirements of the Code of Ethics produced by the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) and we comply with their framework and requirements not only of counselling, but also of professional supervision.

Local Demographics

Southwark is one of the most densely populated and diverse boroughs in the country, with a young, growing and mobile population. According to the 2018 Joint Strategic Needs Assessment, just over 314,200 people live in Southwark, up from 256,700 in 2001. This represents an increase of more than a fifth over that period Southwark is an ethnically diverse borough, varying markedly across age groups and with the population under 20 much more diverse than other age groups. Southwark has one of the fastest growing populations in South East London, with the population projected to grow by nearly 20% by 2030; equating to an extra 60,000 residents.

In (2018) Southwark had the second highest murder rate in London, with 7 deaths attributed to gang-related crime. Many of the victims and perpetrators of violent crime in Southwark are young people, in the 1626 age group. A range of services and organisations are working in the local context to tackle the devastating and wide-ranging effects of violent crime involving loss of life.

Such incidents affect whole families and communities, and the existing psychological support available through mainstream services is not well placed to deal with the complicated grief often associated with violent or traumatic loss. Indeed, and due to budgetary pressures brought about by cuts, the bereavement counselling service once offered by Southwark Carers had to close. Moreover, Southwark is the only London borough that does not have a local Cruse bereavement service or any other specialised bereavement service.

Gender Intake

The client gender ratio for all client enquiries for 2021-2022 is as follows: Males: 22 % Females: 78 %

Client ethnicity

The clientele of Grief Matters Southwark reflects the community of Southwark which is rich in diversity. We are proud of our social inclusion and diversity records and have a good mix of people from all walks of life.

Volunteers

Not only our clients, but our volunteers reflect the community in Southwark and we endeavour to remain inclusive and follow equal opportunities guidance in employing our staff.

Volunteer Training

We have recently looked at new training for staff which will focus on suicide, criminal acts that cause bereavement and other traumatic focused bereavements. This training will provide continuous professional development (CPD) for staff and will be ongoing over the year.

Monitoring and Feedback

We use Clinical Outcomes Routine Evaluation (Core-10) forms to monitor our clients well-being, clinical issues, risk and day-to-day functioning throughout their sessions. We use these at the beginning of the session work, at midway review, and at the end of the sessions. This information which covers wellbeing, can give us relevant information to assess and review our work as well as make our observations on client issues periodically.

HOW YOU CAN HELP GMS

DONATIONS

Our organisation is reliant on donations however big or small. Some of the funding that we receive is restricted for specific purposes, therefore, we need unrestricted funds to spend on things we need that are not specified in other grants. Your donations help us to survive as an organisation and give us flexibility in our spending. Our spending is recorded and updated regularly so you can see what we spend your money on (please see financial income and outgoings at the end of this report. You can make donations to us via contacting us on GriefMatters2019@outlook.com

VOLUNTEERING

Grief Matters Southwark is always looking for volunteers. We recruit: counsellors, fundraisers and administrative staff. Most of our vacancies are for part-time volunteers. If you feel like you have something to offer

our small team or just want to alert us to your services you can send in a CV, please contact Julie via email: GriefMatters2019@outlook.com

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We would like to thank all of our volunteers and supporters, our Patron and all donators, funders and any person or organisation that has helped us to set-up our small charity over the years.

Trustees & Other Grant-Giving Bodies

London Catalyst (Peabody), Patron Jo Brand and The Albert Trust & Grief Matters Southwark Board of Trustees past and present including Vicki Badham our team Superstar fundraiser .

Board of Trustees 2020

The Trustees who acted during the period are set out at the beginning of this document. Election and re- election of Trustees is carried out according to the procedures set out in our Constitution, which is our governing document. Trustees are recruited through: advertising via the Grief Matters Southwark website, local advertisements and other sources. Potential trustees may send in their CVs for us to keep on file in the event that a suitable role comes up that they may apply for. We will keep your information private and confidential under the Data Protection Act and contact you if we see a compatible fit. Applicants that may be considered will be interviewed by a combination of staff. Potential Trustees will be interviewed by 2 trustees and then the full Board of Trustees are informed of the interview outcomes before a decision is made. Other staff and volunteers are interviewed by a combination of the following list: director, managers, trustees. Once this process is complete references, DBSs and other credentials will be checked Once the monitoring processes have been completed and the person employed by us at GMS we will offer training and inductions to the new member of staff.

At Grief Matters Southwark the Trustees take responsibility of the running of the charity in areas of strategy, planning, finance and develop. The day-to-day running of the charity falls on the director and management team. Our clinical team are also authorised to make organisational decisions for GMS if related to clinical issues.

All Trustees and the Director take their responsibilities seriously under UK charity law which requires the Board of Trustees to prepare financial statements that give a transparent and accurate view of their financial affairs. We have prepared our first financial statements for 2020/2021

and endeavour to outsource some of the accountancy work to accounting professionals when appropriate. The Trustees will make the final decisions on which external agencies to use and will have full input into the accounting policies each time they are reviewed. Up to 3 Trustees including the new Treasurer and the director will be part of this planning and implementation process.

The Trustees alongside the director are responsible for the keeping of proper accounts with reasonable accuracy within any given timeframe that may be disclosed to the relevant authorities and in compliance with the rules and regulations of the Charity Commission. Responsibility towards GMS finances, finance controls and prevention of fraud also falls on the director and the Board of Trustees. Any irregularities should be identified and brought to the director and the Board of Trustees for explanation.

Grief Matters Southwark financial statements have been prepared by the Director of Grief Matters Southwark.

Public Benefit

It is a legal requirement on charities is that the Trustees must have regard to Charities Commission guidance on public benefit in deciding on the activities a charity undertakes and must report on those public benefits. As a charity Grief Matters Southwark must provide a description of identifiable benefits in relation to their daily activities and functions of the charity. The Board of Trustees are in agreement that the director and the management teamwork towards their aims and objectives as set out in their governing papers, Constitution of a Charitable Incorporated Organisation. On review of the operational work of Grief Matters Southwark by our Board of Trustees, they are happy that the activities of Grief Matters Southwark are in line with our designated aims and objectives that our organisation provides one-to-one counselling to adult residents of the LB of Southwark. The services are provided at a low-cost fee and are open to all residents of the London Borough of Southwark. For further detail on the activities we undertake and the nature of the public benefit provided see the detailed project reports on our website.

Grief Matters Southwark is dedicated to Equal Opportunities good practice and will only take on fully paid staff after going through a robust and fair recruitment process which aims to employ staff on merit. The GMS employment policy seeks to ensure that no-one receives less favourable treatment on the grounds of all of the protected characteristics:

Risk management and internal control

Our Board of Trustees work alongside the director reviewing, monitoring and checking all our working policies. The director, working alongside the Board of Trustees has produced a risk register that serves the organisation as a remote virtual office. This is monitored and reviewed regularly due to the pandemic. We follow Government guidelines in relation to the pandemic and comply with governmental guidance.

The Trustees oversaw the risk register produced and are satisfied that the arrangements for managing these risks combined with the annual review of financial controls and the reserves policy, will ensure that sufficient resources are available to maintain services for the foreseeable future.

The organisational structure and control system:

  1. There is a clear organisational structure, with a working chain of command that outlines responsibilities and appropriate levels of accountability and reporting lines.

  2. Our Trustees have specialist expertise in: Strategy and planning, law, finance, IT, policy-making.

  3. The Trustees are regularly updated with financial reports and are able to request on demand should they need it for any of their work.

  4. Grief Matters Southwark is committed to staying up-to-date with UK law and in particular, employment law and good management practice.

As set out in our original business plan we have achieved the main aims and objectives of Grief Matters Southwark which is to serve the community of the London Borough of Southwark as an adult bereavement counselling service. We intend to recruit more staff in the future to help with local fundraising (post-pandemic) and more Trustees with furnish us with different skills and experience. We may employ financial experts/and or services as our organisation grows.

Financial Performance

This is our second year as a small charity and we have managed to stay above board financially. Our finances are healthy and growing. Please see breakdown below.

Maintaining Service Delivery

Due to the size and newness of Grief Matters Southwark and because GMS has no guaranteed income, but relies on fundraising, grants and donations, we aim to keep a balance in our ‘General Fund’ which at a minimum would keep the charity going for 1 month. This is to cover unpredicted events. It also helps cover us if we should have to plan an ‘Exit Strategy’. In order to do this we have reviewed our funds and worked out what we need to cover payments to self-employed staff, for insurance, ICO registration and any other annual payment.

Grief Matters Southwark have both a General Fund (as mentioned above) and Restricted Funds which are the funds that were offered to GMS for specific use. Should an ‘Exit Strategy’ take place we would pay back the restricted funds to the original funders.

EXPEN Details March April May June July August Software £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 125.88 £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 5.88 Insurance £ 118.27 Staff Costs £ 100.00 £ 100.00 £ 100.00 Admin £ 35.00 Training £ 100.00

Total £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 344.15 £ 240.88 £ 5.88 £ 105.88 INC Details March April May June July August Counselling Donation £ - £ - £ - £ - £ - £ -

DITURE

September October November December January February £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 11.20

£ 200.00 £ 50.00

£ 199.99

£ 5.88 £ 205.87 £ 5.88 £ 5.88 £ 205.88 £ 61.20

OME

September October November December January February £ 25.00 £ 100.00 £ 25.00 £ 60.00 £ 190.00 £ 5.00 £ 20.00

£ - £ 25.00 £ 100.00 £ 30.00 £ 60.00 £ 210.00

£ 195.88 £ 118.27 £ 550.00 £ 35.00 £ 299.99 £ - £ - £ - £ - £ - £ - £ - £ - £ - £ - £ 1,199.14 £ 400.00 £ 25.00 £ - £ - £ - £ - £ 425.00