Calderdale DART

23/03/2023

DART CLOSURE

DART closed permanently on Thursday 30th March 2023.

Details of other advice providers in Calderdale are as follows:

CITIZENS ADVICE CALDERDALE
Advice on debt, benefits, employment, housing and more
0808 278 7879
www.calderdalecab.org.uk

Disability Support Calderdale
Support with benefits and housing
07944 511 716 | dsmain@hotmail.co.uk

www.disabilitysupportcalderdale.org
Healthy Minds Welfare Rights Service
Help with benefit checks, applications and tribunals
01422 345 154
info@healthymindscalderdale.co.uk
www.healthymindscalderdale.co.uk/
welfare-rights.html

AGE UK CALDERDALE & KIRKLEES
Providing information and advice for older people, their families and carers
01422 252 040
enquiries@ageukck.org.uk
www.ageuk.org.uk/calderdaleandkirklees

NOAH’S ARK CENTRE
Debt and money advice, budgeting courses and other support
01422 364 664
debt@noahsarkcentre.org.uk
www.noahsarkcentre.org.uk/money.html

Unique Ways
Offering support and guidance to families with disabled children/additional needs
01422 343 090 | hi@uniqueways.org.uk
www.uniqueways.org.uk

CALDERDALE COUNCIL EARLY ADVICE SUPPORT TEAM
Guidance and support to prevent financial difficulties escalating 01422 288 005
Money and Wellbeing in Calderdale Information on local services
www.calderdale.gov.uk/mwic
Calderdale Council Local Welfare Assistance
Community living support for essential household items
01422 288 005 | www.calderdale.gov.uk/lwa

WomenCentre
Emotional and practical support
01422 386 500 | info@womencentre.org.uk
https://womencentre.org.uk

Halifax Opportunities Trust
Support with issues including benefits and budgeting. Free internet access at Hanson Lane Enterprise Centre, Halifax, HX1 5PG
01422 347 392
Children’s Centres
Support for issues affecting families including money, benefits, and debt
www.calderdale.gov.uk/childrenscentres

Healthy Holidays
Free holiday club places for children on benefits-related free school meals
www.calderdale.gov.uk/healthyholidays
Calderdale Credit Union
Savings accounts and low cost, affordable loans
01422 386 060
enquiries@calderdalecreditunion.co.uk
www.calderdalecreditunion.co.uk

Together Housing Association
Help and support for Together Housing Association tenants and residents
0300 555 5560 | www.togetherhousing.co.uk
THG.welfareadvice@togetherhousing.co.uk
St. Augustine’s Centre
Providing advice and support to people seeking asylum and refugees
01422 352 492
info@staugustinescentrehalifax.org.uk
www.staugustinescentrehalifax.org.uk

The Silverline
Confidential helpline for older people offering advice, information and friendship
0800 470 8090
StepChange
Debt advice and money management
0800 138 1111 (freephone)
www.stepchange.org
Turn2Us
Information and financial support
0808 802 2000 | www.turn2us.org.uk

Healthy Start Vouchers
Help to buy fruit, vegetables and milk if you are pregnant or have a child under 4 and are on a low income
0300 330 7010 | healthystart.nhs.uk
healthy.start@nhsbas.nhs.uk

Project 17
Advice on housing and financial options for families with children facing severe poverty/homelessness because they have NRPF
07963 509 044 |

Find benefits, grants and financial support online

16/02/2023

💬 Have your say as plans develop for Halifax town centre scheme.

🚦 We're planning changes to bus stops, traffic routing, taxi ranks, cycling and pedestrian zones so that we can improve the town centre for everyone.

Find out more: https://crowd.in/j912nH

16/02/2023

BENEFITS AND WORTK NEWS:
ARE TORY MPS’ LESS HELPFUL TO CLAIMANTS?
We recently suggested that readers contact their MP if they can’t get through to the DWP on the phone. We’ve heard from lots of readers since about their positive experiences of asking their MP for help.
One lesson from your feedback seems to be: don’t make assumptions about whether your MP will be helpful based on which party they belong to or what their voting record on benefits is.
So far, we’ve had more positive feedback about Conservative MPs than any other party. This includes the reader who was both “grateful and amazed” at the help they received from their “useless Tory MP”.

16/02/2023

BENEFITS AND WORK NEWS:
SCOTTISH CLAIMANTS ALREADY BETTER-OFF THAN ENGLISH
Scottish benefits claimants are £580 better-off than their English and Welsh counterparts because of changes to benefits rules, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has found.
The IFS also believes that differences between PIP and the Scottish Adult Disability Payment (ADP) will lead to a higher proportion of claimants in Scotland getting disability benefits in the first place. They will also keep them for longer.
As a result, the difference in income between Scottish and English claimants is likely to grow.

16/02/2023

BENEFITS AND WORK NEWS:
DWP USES SECRETS AND LIES TO UNLAWFULLY SN**CH BACK MONEY
The DWP deliberately lied to a claimant about their rights and unlawfully kept legal guidance secret in order to recover an overpayment of over £8,000 which was entirely due to the DWP’s own mistakes.
The High Court has this month prevented the DWP from taking the money back from the mother of two disabled children, but many tens of thousands more claimants may have been hoodwinked in the same way.
One of the grounds on which the claimant appealed was that the DWP had kept secret its detailed policy on when an overpayment should be waived.
The judge held that this secrecy was unlawful.
The DWP also repeatedly lied to the claimant by denying that she had a right to ask them to consider waiving the debt, denials which the judge called ‘manifestly unlawful’.
Evidence in the trial revealed that in the year to March 2021 a total of 337,000 universal credit claimants were asked to repay overpayments whose cause was error by the DWP. The total value of those overpayments was £228 million.
Amazingly, the DWP claims that only 47 claimants asked for their overpayments to be waived in the whole of 2020 and just 7 of those requests were granted.
As the judge commented: “If the claimant’s experience of twice having her request for waiver rebuffed without consideration is not unique to her, the number of requests in fact made may exceed the number recorded . . .”
In fact, many thousands may have requested a waiver and been ignored, whilst many thousands more may have had no idea that they even had the right to ask.

16/02/2023

BENEFITS AND WORK NEWS

ALARMING INCREASE IN PIP DISQUALIFICATIONS
42,000 claimants lost their PIP award in 2021 because they allegedly failed to return their AR1 PIP review form according to Tom Pursglove, DWP minister for disabled people.
This is an unexplained increase of almost 300% in just two years.
It seems very possible that many disallowed claimants are returning their forms on time, but an increasingly overwhelmed and broken DWP is either losing them or taking far too long to record that they have been received.
Other claimants may have failed to return the review form because of the effects of a physical or mental health condition.
A tragic example of this is the death of Laura Winham, who we wrote about just last month. Laura’s disability benefit was stopped without any welfare checks after she failed to return her PIP claim form when being transferred from DLA. This is in spite of the fact she was known to have a severe mental illness.
Yet according to Pursglove, claimants with serious mental health or cognitive conditions or who are vulnerable in other ways should have their files ‘watermarked’ to show they need additional support.
DWP policy is that these claimants should not have their PIP stopped because of a failure to return a form.

13/02/2023

A minister has been told to carry out an urgent investigation after the number of disabled people whose disability benefits were stopped when they failed to return a vital form rose by more than 45…

07/02/2023

We're delighted to be part of an incredible group of organisations, working to help people during the crisis. You'll hear more from the Together Through This Crisis group in the coming weeks. Check out the website to find out how to get help, or give help: http://ow.ly/RCIR50MLvNQ

06/02/2023

Here’s an important DLA tip: do not fill in the Disability Living Allowance form based on your child’s worst day! This is a common myth — and one which, in the worst case, could open you up to accusations of fraud.

It’s important to include information about their bad days, but you can’t give the impression that this is always the situation if that’s not true.

Instead, try to describe their needs across both ‘bad days’ and ‘better days’. Avoid terms like ‘good days’ or ‘normal days’, as they can imply your child doesn’t need any extra help on those days.

If your child’s condition varies and there are days when they need less help, you can still get DLA as long as there is a pattern of substantial care needs or mobility issues. If their condition varies a lot, it’s a good idea to keep a diary for at least a week before completing the form.

And make sure to tick all boxes that apply to your child — even if it doesn’t apply all of the time. You can provide more information about any variation in needs below each set of tick-box questions, or at the end of the form.

For more expert advice and top tips to help you complete the DLA form, visit 👉 contact.org.uk/dla-form

06/02/2023

Nearly a quarter of a million people have signed a disabled campaigner’s petition that calls for supermarket giant Tesco to stop introducing self-service, card-only tills in its stores. Pat McCarth…

02/02/2023

DART CLOSURE

At a Trustees meeting held in July 2022 it was agreed, DART would close at the end of March 2023. The Council has since agreed to transfer the funding from DART to Disability Support Calderdale for a 12-month period commencing 1st April 2023.
DART was originally formed in 1984 under the then Manpower Services Commission ‘Community Programme’ Scheme. At that time there were 13 members of staff employed as we also managed and operated the minibus service on behalf of the Disabled Adults Minibus Service (DAMBA). There were 3 Advisers along with support workers, clerical support staff along with minibus drivers and escorts.

From 1987 Calderdale Council agreed to fund one of the posts within DART and a few years later DAMBA separated from DART and the Council took on the funding of the whole advice and information service. The Council then encouraged DART to find funding from other sources and in 1999 we secured lottery funding which enabled us to employ more staff and therefore deliver more services to our client group. This funding ran for 7 years and since that time we have also had success in securing funding from a variety of other sources including the lottery; PCT/CCG; the government (Targeted Support Fund/Pension Plus) and a host of Trusts and Charities including Lloyds, Allen Lane Foundation; Community Foundation for Calderdale; the Postcode Lottery Trust and the Carers Project to name but a few.

Applying for funding whilst at the same time delivering a service has been a struggle and very time consuming and at times very soul destroying. In recent years funding became much harder to secure and we also lost short-term funding streams which in turn meant we had to let experienced staff go.

In recent times the Covid pandemic added to our difficulties and the recent cost of living crisis also increased our running costs. This meant we had to call on our reserves to maintain the service and when it became apparent these reserves would eventually run out, the Trustees took the decision to close, in order that we would be able to meet all of our financial liabilities.

Since 1984 we have assisted many thousands of clients with many thousands of issues. To see the difference our interventions made to the lives of so many individuals was a constant reminder of why the organisation was set up in the first place. We have helped many clients to claim the benefits to which they were entitled and have consistently achieved excellent success rates.

Throughout our history the extra income we generated for clients regularly equated to £10 for every £1 of funding we received.
Since the announcement of the closure, we have been contacted by many clients who wanted to thank us for the support we have given to them over the years. A selection of these anonymised comments follows:

“I can only say thanks for all the help given over the years for myself and three other family members. This must span from the 1990s to the present day.
What a sad day”.

“Thank you so much for the email informing me DART will be closing.
I'd like to take this opportunity in showing my gratitude towards the help and advice given when I used the service last year, I'd never have managed without your help.
I truly hope Calderdale Council replace the service with a provider who has the same extensive ability and support”.

“I initially contacted you in the summer for help with my son and his family following a diagnosis of Parkinson’s. I would like to thank you for your invaluable assistance, often responding extremely quickly, in offering such expert advice. I would also like to express my regret that your service will be closing in March as I am sure that there will be many other people in a similar position to our family who will struggle to make sense of our complicated benefit system without your support. I wish you well for the future”.

“An irreplaceable group, no other group has done so much for so many Disabled and non-Disabled people, you will be missed”

“I am really sorry to hear this, they were really helpful to me at the beginning of last year after I suffered a collapsed back and was diagnosed with bone cancer. They checked all my forms for me to ensure I received the correct benefits amongst other advice”

“So sorry to hear about DART closing down.
Warm wishes and thanks to Tony, hoping you find a good position soon”.

We would love to hear your opinions/memories of the service you have received from DART over the last 38 years and hope that you will continue to receive the advice you need in the future.
DART CLOSURE
At a Trustees meeting held in July 2022 it was agreed, DART would close at the end of March 2023. The Council has since agreed to transfer the funding from DART to Disability Support Calderdale for a 12-month period commencing 1st April 2023.
DART was originally formed in 1984 under the then Manpower Services Commission ‘Community Programme’ Scheme. At that time there were 13 members of staff employed as we also managed and operated the minibus service on behalf of the Disabled Adults Minibus Service (DAMBA). There were 3 Advisers along with support workers, clerical support staff along with minibus drivers and escorts.

From 1987 Calderdale Council agreed to fund one of the posts within DART and a few years later DAMBA separated from DART and the Council took on the funding of the whole advice and information service. The Council then encouraged DART to find funding from other sources and in 1999 we secured lottery funding which enabled us to employ more staff and therefore deliver more services to our client group. This funding ran for 7 years and since that time we have also had success in securing funding from a variety of other sources including the lottery; PCT/CCG; the government (Targeted Support Fund/Pension Plus) and a host of Trusts and Charities including Lloyds, Allen Lane Foundation; Community Foundation for Calderdale; the Postcode Lottery Trust and the Carers Project to name but a few.

Applying for funding whilst at the same time delivering a service has been a struggle and very time consuming and at times very soul destroying. In recent years funding became much harder to secure and we also lost short-term funding streams which in turn meant we had to let experienced staff go.

In recent times the Covid pandemic added to our difficulties and the recent cost of living crisis also increased our running costs. This meant we had to call on our reserves to maintain the service and when it became apparent these reserves would eventually run out, the Trustees took the decision to close, in order that we would be able to meet all of our financial liabilities.

Since 1984 we have assisted many thousands of clients with many thousands of issues. To see the difference our interventions made to the lives of so many individuals was a constant reminder of why the organisation was set up in the first place. We have helped many clients to claim the benefits to which they were entitled and have consistently achieved excellent success rates.

Throughout our history the extra income we generated for clients regularly equated to £10 for every £1 of funding we received.
Since the announcement of the closure, we have been contacted by many clients who wanted to thank us for the support we have given to them over the years. A selection of these anonymised comments follows:

“I can only say thanks for all the help given over the years for myself and three other family members. This must span from the 1990s to the present day.
What a sad day”.

“Thank you so much for the email informing me DART will be closing.
I'd like to take this opportunity in showing my gratitude towards the help and advice given when I used the service last year, I'd never have managed without your help.
I truly hope Calderdale Council replace the service with a provider who has the same extensive ability and support”.

“I initially contacted you in the summer for help with my son and his family following a diagnosis of Parkinson’s. I would like to thank you for your invaluable assistance, often responding extremely quickly, in offering such expert advice. I would also like to express my regret that your service will be closing in March as I am sure that there will be many other people in a similar position to our family who will struggle to make sense of our complicated benefit system without your support. I wish you well for the future”.

“An irreplaceable group, no other group has done so much for so many Disabled and non-Disabled people, you will be missed”

“I am really sorry to hear this, they were really helpful to me at the beginning of last year after I suffered a collapsed back and was diagnosed with bone cancer. They checked all my forms for me to ensure I received the correct benefits amongst other advice”

“So sorry to hear about DART closing down.
Warm wishes and thanks to Tony, hoping you find a good position soon”.

We would love to hear your opinions/memories of the service you have received from DART over the last 38 years and hope that you will continue to receive the advice you need in the future.