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Comic Relief has announced it will award £50,000 to help support communities affected by the recent flooding in Cumbria.
Recent figures suggest that in Cumbria and Lancashire an estimated 5,200 homes have been flooded and more than 43,000 homes have or are suffering from power cuts.
Houses, business premises and community facilities have all been affected. Roads, railways and other elements of the county’s infrastructure have been severely damaged.
Cumbria Community Foundation (CCF) – which has a strong track record of setting up and managing emergency funds - has established the Cumbria Flood Recovery Fund 2015, committing £50k of its own reserves to start the fund.
Comic Relief has committed to match that fund with a grant of its own.
Funds are for charitable purposes in connection with the relief of hardship within the county of Cumbria caused directly or indirectly by storm damage and flooding in December 2015.
The funding will be distributed in two phases to cover immediate support and supplementary support.
The first phase of funding will go to individual households in priority groups, including people who are over 70 years old, families with children under five years old, people with disabilities and those without contents insurance.
Grants will also be made to front line services such as Red Cross, Citizens Advice Bureaux, the Law Centre, recycling services and activities for children and young people.
The second phase of funding will award grants for individual households whose incomes are affected over a longer term period and those who experience increased household expense due to relocation resulting from the floods.
Charities will also benefit from the fund where they have suffered damage to their property, or are proving emotional support and counselling to people in the affected communities.
Previously Comic Relief has responded in a similar way to the impact of floods in the UK. UKCF – an umbrella organisation for community foundations – has previously distributed funds through local organisations and Comic Relief has recommended that they handle this grant, distributing the funds through the CCF.
