Home-Start

Home-Start in Waverley (formerly known as Home-Start Farnham and Haslemere), part of the UK's leading family support charity, have won a five year award from the Big Lottery to extend their service comprehensively across the whole of Waverley Borough. The new five year programme is being rolled out in stages.  We have been able to extend our service to Godalming, Elstead and Bramley and are looking to expand into Cranleigh towards the end of 2012.

Douglas Mellor, Chair said "This is a major initiative for Waverley and indeed for us. Already through our dedicated volunteer teams we have supported 530 families starting in Farnham just 12 years ago, and Haslemere 4 years later.  Our plans to reach out into Waverley were first formulated about 6 years ago, and have been recast a number of times since.  We have struggled through determined euphoria, misplaced optimism, funding disappointments, recessions and changes of Management Team, until we received the news that we had finally won support from the Big Lottery, which will enable us to make our plans for Waverley a reality".

Whist this is indeed good news for Waverley, the project can only be successful if we continue to receive support for our Farnham Scheme.  Funding for the Farnham Scheme remains completely independent from this Big Lottery award, and continues to be wholly dependent on the ongoing generosity and support of Farnham townsfolk, Surrey County Council and a number of local Trusts.  This support has understandably softened since the credit crunch, constrained by our national and local economy, and although our Management Committee have been working hard to create more opportunities to win funding, we are still in need of some £40,000 each and every year, to provide the core service in Farnham.

Dolores Robertson, Scheme Manager, said if you feel you can help us either in our fundraising efforts or by volunteering please call us at our Farnham Office on 01252 737453, or email us at info@homestartwaverley.org   or contact us through our website at www.homestart-fh.com