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Financial advice services in Nottingham given 3-year funding boost amid ‘really high’ demand

By Latifa Yedroudj, Junior Local Democracy Reporter

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Nottingham City Council has approved more than £1.2 million in funding to run free advice and support services for households amid high unemployment, benefit claims and debt.

The funding will go to Advice Nottingham, a consortium of six advice agencies in the city, dedicated to supporting struggling households.

Funding for these services was due to end in September this year.

Councillors have now approved a further £1.2 million to keep them running for another three years.

The decision was made at the Commissioning and Procurement Executive Committee on Tuesday, April 15.

The council will now spend £406,000 a year on advice centres between October 2025 and September 2028.

It comes as official council figures show a total of 6.3 per cent of the population in Nottingham now claim out-of-work benefits.

Documents say this is a two per cent rise since before the Covid pandemic.

Lower income households now make up almost a quarter of the city population, council documents also show.

Speaking after the meeting, Cllr Cheryl Barnard (Lab) told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “Most of the residents who seek advice have health problems, especially mental health problems, so it’s it’s a way of contributing towards the health and well-being of our residents across the city.

“Overall, it’s a really good proposal that enables our residents to access advice when they need it and get the benefits they are entitled to, and sometimes additional benefits that they didn’t know they entitled to as well.”

Cllr Linda Woodings (Lab) who chaired the meeting, also said the demand for advice services in the city is “really high” and that the funding is much needed.

She told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “We have very low levels of disposable income and high levels of unemployment in Nottingham city.

“One priority of our health and well-being policy is financial vulnerability.

“We are able to use some of our public health grant to actually fund advice centres. The good news is that this is £406,000 per year for the next three years to take effect from this coming October after the current funding runs out.

“We’re giving the money to the Advice Nottingham consortium to distribute to the different advice services across the city and so it’s much needed.

“The demand for advice services is really high at the moment.”

She added: “People are missing out on a huge amount of money they are entitled to.

“Our advice services can also prevent people from being made homeless.

“It will literally put money in the pockets of Nottingham residents.

“We think it’s really important funding to continue, and it’s really good that we’ve managed to put aside funding for the next three years to keep the services running.”