# **Trustees’ Annual Report Gateway Sidmouth**
## **July 1st 2023 – June 30th 2024**
## **Legal and Administrative Information**
Gateway Sidmouth Charity number: 1203423
Principle office: 48 High Street Sidmouth EX10 8EJ
Trustees:
Susan Marshall – chair Robert McIlwraith – treasurer Doug Millar Martin Marshall Dan Pawson-Pounds Stuart Huntley
Additional trustees who served in the reporting year:
Helen Usmar – resigned February 2024. Martin Dawes – resigned
Independent examiner:
Mr Paul Egan
## **Report of the trustees**
The accounts for the year July 1st 2023 to June 30th 2024 will be assessed and approved by an independent examiner. Income in this period exceeded the £25,000 threshold for this requirement to be triggered
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Gateway Sidmouth – Annual Report and Accounts
## **Introduction**
Gateway Sidmouth (The Charity) was approved by the Charity Commission as a Charitable Incorporated Organisation on the 6th June 2023. An organisation, using the name Gateway, has been in operation for several years under the Charitable umbrella of Sidmouth Parish Church and a leadership team with representatives from the church. Once the new charity was registered Gateway Sidmouth transitioned to its own board of trustees and organisational arrangements. The ethos and objectives of the charity continue largely unchanged from the previous ways of working. The principle activity of the charity is to provide a safe space that people can access to discuss their housing situation with volunteers and receive the help and support that each individual needs.
## **Objectives and activities**
The objective of the charity is the support and relieve the poverty of homeless people and those at risk of homelessness through information, signposting and practical support including food, clothing and equipment.
This objective is achieved in the following ways:
- Volunteers meet in the Mustard Seed café in Sidmouth four mornings a week (10am – 12md) and are available to any members of the public who want to talk about their housing situation.
- We offer a non-judgemental listening ear and hospitality to those in need.
- We provide a warm meal to those that are hungry.
- We provide clothing and tents to keep the homeless warm and dry during inclement weather.
- We liaise with the local services including East Devon District Housing Department and East Devon Rough Sleepers coordinators to support people to find housing solutions.
- We liaise with the General Practitioners’ surgery and Food bank for people in need of their services and we are extremely grateful that we can refer people to the local swimming pool for a shower.
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Gateway Sidmouth – Annual Report and Accounts
- We assist people who have been recently homed but have no carpets, curtains, curtain poles or white goods to have essential items.
The first year of operation for the charity has seen it establish its basic requirements to enable it operate safely and effectively and these will be built on in future years. This year the charity has:
Established a healthy cash position. It received an initial fund transfer from the parish church that held funds for the predecessor organisation of some £22,134 and with fundraising and donation income the Charity saw some £40175.28 of income in its first year of operation.
- Set up its bank account. The Charity set up its bank account with Lloyds Bank at the end of July 2023. Lloyds was chosen as it had a branch in Sidmouth and they reacted well to support requests when looking at options for accounts. Initially one account was set up ( a current account) although later, in October, a deposit account was opened and throughout the year £18,000 was transferred to this new account. Interest on this account is shown as a separate item in the year end accounts.
- Put in place new insurance policies to cover the activities of the charity and its trustees and volunteers.
- Developed safe recruiting procedures for both volunteers and trustees including application forms, references, interviews and Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) Checks. These need to be formalised into a procedure. All new volunteers are ‘buddied’ with experienced volunteers
- Contracted with a third party to provide DBS checks and initiated its safeguarding training for all volunteers.
- Introduced digital client records to replace paper records and a digital database. The paper records had all the inherent problems of paper record management and the database, whilst a good initiative it was difficult to use and didn’t help the volunteers. The new system and a new laptop has required people to acquire new skills, this has been easier for some than others but everyone is now able to add new clients and update records.
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Gateway Sidmouth – Annual Report and Accounts
- Identified the need for a confidential space for telephone calls, potentially seeing clients and safe storage of data and some emergency supplies led the trustees to rent an office space close to the Mustard Seed café. This was refurbished and equipped with a generous donation from one of our supporters.
- Continued its recruitment of trustees and volunteers
## **Our work with clients**
The Charity operates out of a local Café – The Mustard Seed. This is a Café owned and operated by the Mustard Seed Ministries Trust a charity formed by local Christians. Gateway operates on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday between the hours of 10 am and 12 noon. We owe a great deal of thanks to the Mustard Seed and its volunteers and staff for their daily support
The charity has kept its aims and objectives under continuous review this year and in making decisions the trustees have had regard to the public benefit of their decisions. In particular that there are sufficient resources to alleviate the poverty associated with homelessness or the financial difficulties faced by those struggling to furnish their home.
In meeting this requirement this year Gateway Sidmouth has:
- Provided an open access service to anyone in the area four mornings a week.
- Provided a warm meal and beverage for those who are hungry
- Provided warm clothing for those who are sleeping rough. This year the prolonged periods of very wet weather created a need for more frequent provision of clothes as people sleeping out were getting wet through on a daily basis.
- Provided tents to those sleeping rough
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Gateway Sidmouth – Annual Report and Accounts
- Facilitated rough sleepers to have a shower through a partnership with the local swimming pool. Our thanks go to the Sidmouth swimming pool for enabling people to maintain a level of dignity by washing regularly.
- Assisted people to acquire the essentials that make an unfurnished house a home. This has included carpets and curtain rails this year.
- Liaised with and facilitated direct contact with East Devon District Council rough sleepers coordinators to support clients to access accommodation.
## **Donors and fundraising**
The charity is entirely dependent on the generosity of local organisations and individuals who donate monies to support our work. The trustees would like to thank everyone who has supported Gateway in the last year because without their help we wouldn’t be able to continue our work.
We received £11,943 income in the form of donations and £3,597 from charitable fundraising activities from many sources and whilst it is difficult to mention one without mentioning everyone, we are particularly grateful for the ongoing support of Sidmouth Town Council ( who provided a grant of £1,000), several of the churches in Sidmouth and Salcombe Regis, Sidmouth Lions Club and the Mustard Seed café. We also wish to recognise the contribution that individuals make on a regular basis either through a monthly or annual donation.
We registered for ‘Gift Aid’ this year and added a further £979 to our funds through claims made under this scheme.
## **Expenditure**
The trustees keep the expenses of the charity under regular review and aim to keep the operating expenses as low as is reasonably practical.
Expenditure totalled some £13,567 and was broken down in to areas such as client support, volunteer expenses, Website update and IT support, insurance, premises rental and utilities.
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Gateway Sidmouth – Annual Report and Accounts
Our support to clients includes a warm space for conversations about their situation. The hospitality of a cup of tea and a meal for the hungry. We have provided tents, clothing, towels and toiletries but most of these items are donated.
There was a one off cost this year to equip and decorate a new office as our base, which was made possible by a generous donation from Dr G Rich and Prof S Purdey. The office provides much needed storage for confidential records and IT equipment and enables confidential conversations with clients.
## **Volunteers**
Gateway is extremely grateful to and wishes to thank all our volunteers for the skills, knowledge, experience and commitment they bringing to helping the homeless or those facing homelessness in our community.
During the year (February 2024) one of our hard working and very committed volunteers decided to leave the Charity. This caused some concern at the time, as she was so involved in all the activities of the Charity and was also a trustee. A great deal of work by the trustees and the other volunteers has seen the Charity adjust to this loss well and new systems and working practices have been put in place to enable the Charity to function effectively.
The charity has also seen a further small turnover in volunteers with some leaving and others starting. We are very fortunate to have in our cohort of starters some volunteers with experience in our area of work and others committed to learning who have a strong sense of wanting to help people who are facing homelessness.
Our volunteer leavers have had many reasons for stopping their face to face work with clients and where there are lessons for running the charity we welcome this feedback. Some volunteers are offering support in new ways rather than with clients such as sourcing goods needed by our clients or managing historic paper-based client files to ensure that all our records are digitised.
We currently have a small group of nine volunteers with two new volunteers ready to start once we have completed their recruitment checks. We need more volunteers to allow us to cover periods of absence and holidays easily and are always happy to hear from anyone who is interested to volunteer. Our recruitment is mainly by word 6
Gateway Sidmouth – Annual Report and Accounts
of mouth although we plan to raise awareness of the opportunity to volunteer more widely next year.
## **Trustees**
As chair I am extremely grateful to the talented team of trustees who share their knowledge, experience and wisdom to direct Gateway as it moves from fledgling charity to an established organisation.
We are actively seeking new trustees to fill the vacancies left by our colleagues earlier this year. As with volunteers, this tends to be by word of mouth and again we will be more active next raising the profile of the charity and our need for new trustees.
**……………………………………………..**
**Susan Marshall Chair – Gateway Sidmouth**
**Date 17.12.2024**
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Gateway Sidmouth – Annual Report and Accounts
Gateway Si £ Income and Expenditure Account
£
|INCOME|||
|---|---|---|
|Donatons an|9442.5||
|Charitable fu|3597.1||
|Church funds|22134.6||
|Mustard seed|485.7||
|Grants|1000||
|Donatons - O|2500||
|Gif Aid|979.38||
|TOTAL INCO|40139.28|40139.28|
|EXPENDITURE|||
|Volunteer ex|1860||
|Website / da|2759||
|Mobile phon|171.6||
|Insurance|802||
|Premises - re|918||
|Marketng ma|750||
|Client equip|1036||
|Food and bev|2953||
|Repairs, upda|2317||
|TOTAL EXPEN|-13566.6|-13566.6|
|NET GAINS /(|273|273|
|NET INCOME / (EXPENDITURE)||26845.68|
|Gateway Sidmouth Drafaccounts J
|£
|£
|Note||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|Balance Sheet|||||
|CURRENT ASSETS|||||
|Cash at bank and in hand|25307.97||||
|Debtors - money owed to charity|1833.18|||2|
|TOTAL CURRENT ASSETS|27141.15|27141.15|||
|LIABILITIES|||||
|Creditors - amounts falling due within on|-295.67|||3|
|NET CURRENT ASSETS|26845.48|26845.48|||
|TOTAL FUNDS|26845.48|26845.48||1|
Note 1 - The difference between the net income and total funds is down to rounding errors This amounts to £0.20 Note 2 - Church donations for last 6 months = £853.8 / Gift Aid £979.38 = £1833.18 Church funds received in July / Gift Aid received in Oct Note 3 - Mustard Seed Costs for June 24 = £292 / Dissenter utilities for June 24 = £3.67 Both invoices received in July
CHARITY COMMISSION
FOR ENGLAND AND WALES
Independent examiner's
report on the accounts
Section A
Independent Examiner's Report
Report to the trusteesl
members of
s•r S IpNAJT44
On accounts for the year
ended
Charity no
(if any)
121342$
Set out on pages
I report to the trustees on my examination of the accounts of the above
charity ("the Trust") for the year ended .i13 1 11ffl l Yy-f Y.
Responsibilities and As the charity trustees of the Trust, you are responsible for the preparation
basis of report of thè accounts in accordance with the requirements of the Charities Act
2011 {"the Act").
I report in resped of my examination ofthe Trust's accounts carried out
under section 145 of the 2011 Act and in carrying out my examination. I
have followed Ihe applicable Directions given by the Charity Commission
under section 145{5)Ib) of the Act.
I have completed my examination. I confimi that no material matters have
come to my attention (other than that disclosed below ") in connection with
the examination which gives me cause to believe that in, any material
respect..
accounling records were not kept in accordance with section 130 of
the Act or
the accounts do not accord with the accounting records
Independent
examiner's statement
I have no concerns and have come across no other matters in connection
with the examination to which attention should be drawn in order to enable a
propér understanding of the accounts to be reached.
Please delete the words in the brackets if they do not apply.
Signed:
Date:
Name:
$6An/
Relevant professlonal
qualificationls) or body
(if any)
Address:
-V&knf
IER
October 2018
Section B
Disclosure
Only complete if the examiner needs to highlight matters of concern (see CC32,
Independent examination of charity accounts.. directions and guidan¢6 for
examiners).
Glve here brlef detalls of
any Items that the
examlnerwlshes to
disclose.
IER
October 2018