Cost of living crisis: Rotherham Council to provide £250 cash grants to help struggling households pay rising energy bills

The cash is part of a £2m council budget underspend, which has been earmarked for a Covid recovery fund.

The council proposes to use the cash to “help residents against the backdrop of growing concerns around the cost of living due to inflation and significant increases in energy and fuel bills in particular.”

A report, to RMBC’s next cabinet meeting on March 28 recommends that the £500,000 is provided to enable cash grants of up to £250 per household that submits a claim.

The funding is on top of the government’s council tax rebate of £150 to help households in band A-D with rising energy costs, to be paid next month.

Households must be able to demonstrate that their rising energy bills have “placed them in a financially vulnerable situation and that this support would enable them to ease that burden at a time of wider financial pressures from other rising household costs.”

The Citizens Advice Bureau has reported a 50 per cent increase requests for financial support since January 2021, according to the report.

“Access to the support would be via an online claims process supported via referrals from the Councils debt support packages, provided to people accessing normal debt advice provision through the advocacy and appeals services and…. through Citizens Advice.

The report proposes that the council designs an online claim form, which would be available “in the early part of the 2022/23 financial year”.

A further £300,000 of the Covid recovery fund will be used to provide discretionary housing payments for residents in receipt of housing benefit.

The funding would cover costs for residents struggling with a rent shortfall, rent deposits or rent in advance if they need to move home.

£100,00 of fund will be used for “cultural recovery events and opportunities that will enable people to reconnect”.

This includes plans for a celebration on Saturday June 4 “celebrating diverse communities across the Commonwealth”, a garden party at Clifton Park on June 5, and the Queens Jubilee celebrations.

The remaining funding of £679,000 will be set aside for further support in the future.