MONEY mentors funded by the council have helped dozens of families reduce their debts by thousands of pounds.

But more needs to be done to help others, councillors were told.

Members of the corporate and resources overview and scrutiny committee heard about Swindon Borough Council’s work on financial inclusion from officer Andy Stevens.

He said: “Financial inclusion is one of the council’s pledges – we do it to try and help residents from getting into debt.”

One of the things the council does is to fund money mentors who work at the Citizens Advice Bureau – to whom people can be referred, especially if their benefits have been kept.

Mr Stevens said: “In 2019, 62 families were assisted and £43,000 of additional income was identified and debts reduced by £50,000. Unfortunately a further 57 individuals had appointments but failed to attend.”

One of the councillors, Vinay Manro, said: “I’m concerned that 48 per cent of people didn’t attend their appointments with the money mentors.

“Do you know why? What can you do to prevent missed appointments?”

Mr Stevens said the mentors had taken to ringing people up before their appointments.

He said: “They speak to them to reassure them about the appointment, that we are there to help them.”

Another councillor, Steve Allsopp, remembered back to the 1990s and asked: “In those days the council supported the local credit union and provided loan guarantees to the union so it could help people who might not have previously been members, especially with their rent – it was particularly to stop people losing their housing.

“Have you thought about doing something like that now? As furlough ends and if there’s an increase in unemployment, we might see more claims being made.”

Mr Stevens said: “We do have the powers using our emergency assistance fund to be able to guarantee a loan from the credit union. It’s not something we’ve done very often, but there is provision.”

He added that because some of the staff at Swindon and Wiltshire Credit Union has been shielding during the coronavirus crisis, the union had not been able to open at a number of the community sessions it normally visits – and that it could always do with more volunteers who would be able to visit community centres and take in people’s savings.

More details on what the credit union does, how to save with it and what it offers are available at www.wascu.co.uk

To speak to a money mentor at Swindon Citizens Advice Bureau visit www.citizensadviceswindon.org.uk