Background

In early 2024 we applied for and obtained a lottery grant of £9999 a year for two years to maintain the provision of counselling for our very low income clients. The challenge was to ensure that we spent this in a way that benefitted the most people , and that the spend was spread out equally across the two year period to maintain our ability to support these people throughout this time. This s a complex process because at time of initial allocation it is not known how many sessions will be required. Our initial plan is always a 6 week course but severe cases may extend to 12 weeks, and some may finish early.

At the time our break even costs for our charity work was £25 a session , supported by an NHS

contract to supply counselling to local GP’s . The small profit from this was used to keep the cost of our charity work down. Each client pays what they can afford , and those who can not afford the break even cost ( initially £25) has their contribution topped up from the lottery fund.

In January 2025 the NHS funding for our GP counselling contract was due to run out and the

revised business plan without the financial support of this contract was altered to £35 per session to break even, meaning a greater % of our clients needed support. Work is ongoing to set up further commercial projects to underpin the inevitable shortfall arising from our work with disadvantaged clients, but no major contracts have yet been achieved.

Analysis of Project

2024-2025

288 clients qualified for grant support

82 clients did not take up counselling - 28% - this is consistent with our historical figures due to changing mind , obtaining NHS treatment , etc.

206 clients benefitted from the grant .

5 were totally supported

24 were supported with £15 per session

183 were supported with £5-£10

Total spend for first year of grant £1074 slight overspend from planned £9999

Total number of sessions 1056

Average number of sessions 4 per client ( range 1 -12 )

Problems at presentation

ANXIETY and DEPRESSION    25%

RELATIONSHIP                     20%

MEDICAL                             12%

BEREAVEMENT                     11%

TRAUMA                                7%

CHILDHOOD ISSUES              8%

DOMESTIC ABUSE (DA)          9%

BURNOUT & STRESS      6%

RETURNERS                           1%

SUICIDAL IDEATION               1%

ANGER                                   1%

AGE 

18-29                 31%

30-59                 60%

60+                     8%

GENDER

M                    33%

F                     66%

MODE

FACE TO FACE    309

REMOTE              49

2025-2026 ( 4 months data )

To date 312 qualified for grant support

2 totally supported

Most of the rest supported between £10 and £20 a session.

Total spend so far year two - £4775- marginally over plan.

Both years

Vast majority seen within 6 weeks - usually a lot less . One or two take longer but this has been

due to client specifying a single particular date/time which takes longer to pair with a free slot.

Conclusion

This grant has been very successful in enabling us to continue to provide very low cost counselling to a large group of people ,despite increasing the quality of our service by retaining qualified ( and therefore paid ) counsellors, with the inevitable increase in the charities outgoings.

Looking to the future we see no decrease in the demand for low cost counselling . In an attempt to reduce our reliance on grants we have in the past obtained commercial contracts - the profits from which are entirely used to underpin our charitable work . The current contracts have now ceased and so to ensure our continued ability to help those with the greatest financial stress we need to obtain further grants for when this current lottery grant ends in March 2026.

 At the same time we need to work on further commercial contracts.