Central Southport, Sefton, Merseyside: Resident-led Enquiry on Debt Advice and Support

Debt advice service audit

The first enquiry focussed on identifying the existing, local providers of debt advice, visiting them and collecting information with a view to supporting them to identify ways of improving the reach and accessibility of their services. Six Resident Advisers, in partnership with the Academic Lead, conducted this audit, in March 2017, in the form of a ‘mystery shop’ exercise.

Identifying the organisations

Firstly, debt advice services were identified and listed on the basis of the Resident Advisers’ experiential knowledge, information provided by the local authority, by Sefton CVS and other stakeholders, and information obtained through web searches (using Google Search). Nine organisations were identified as being potentially relevant to the enquiry because they were themselves providing debt advice or because they provided related services and would signpost people to other debt advice services. The list of organisations to visit as part of the audit was derived from this initial list by excluding those organisations that only provided advice on housing or welfare benefits, those whose services were delivered exclusively over the phone, those without an office or other premises within the Neighbourhood for Learning boundary and those whose opening times forbade peer researchers from visiting. The five remaining services were located on a map of the area.

Conducting the field research

Resident Advisers, in pairs, visited these local debt advice agencies on 14 March 2017, between 1.30pm and 2.30pm, and collected information on the range of services on offer on a template document in the form of a notes booklet designed for this purpose. The booklet acted as an ‘aide-mémoire’ and included prompts about the types of information that peer researchers might decide to collect. The prompts were not overly prescriptive so as not to unduly constrain the information peer researchers might consider relevant and of importance. The prompts referred to the scope of the advice services offered; the gaps in the services offered; whether one service signposted to other services, and local people’s opinion of the service. The template encouraged the peer researchers to record their own views about the service, their suggestions for improvement, any key lessons they identified in their visit and their experiences of conducting this piece of field research.

After the visits, peer researchers came together with the academic lead person to discuss their findings, collate field notes, identify areas of improvements and recommendations and agree on key points to communicate to the LOG through a briefing report.

Learning about personal finances, debt and gambling risk in the local school curriculum

To explore the contribution of school education to personal finance literacy, Resident Advisors and the Academic Lead arranged to have discussions with representatives from two local schools in March and April 2018. The group worked jointly in a preparatory session with a focus on undertaking qualitative interviews. At the meetings with the school representatives, the Resident Advisers took notes and, subsequently completed a thematic analysis of their notes, identified key messages and communicated them to the LOG. This work eventually led to the development of an intervention for school-age children.

Theatre-based workshops in local schools: learning about the risks of gambling and about the help and support that are available

The group made a successful application to the Community Fund of the England Illegal Money Lending Team (IMLT: stoploansharks.co.uk) for a grant to deliver a drama-based workshop in local schools. The purpose of the workshop was to alert pupils, teachers and administrators to the dangers of gambling and borrowing from ‘loan sharks’; to inform them of the signs of gambling addiction, and to make them aware of available supportive services.

The workshop comprised a monologue delivered by an actor followed by an interactive session with the audience. Leaflets with the contact details of debt advice services were distributed at the workshop. In terms of their reach, it was estimated that these workshops were attended by six hundred young people in the area.