Millions of crisis funds unspent

Bevan Foundation Director, Victoria Winckler, has said it is ‘very surprising’ that the Welsh Government’s Discretionary Assistance Fund, established to help people in crisis, is significantly under-spent. A Plaid Cymru question to the Minister for Communities and Tackling Poverty revealed that only £4.8m of the £10.2m fund had been spent to date.  Commenting in the Western Mail on 29^th January 2014 Victoria said:

“It is very surprising as allocation to the fund was based on levels of demand for its predecessor, so it is not as if it was a number plucked out of the air,” she said.

“Given the purpose of the fund, my expectation would be that demand would be rising, rather than decreasing. I would expect given past demand…the budget would have almost all gone.”