Mission Partner: Alternatives Trust

St Giles’ and St George’s is delighted to continue supporting Alternatives Trust East London, a small charity providing support to vulnerable families in Newham. In practice these are almost all migrant families headed by a lone mother. Around 80-90% of those the charity works with are homeless, have experienced trauma, and have no access to public funds. Support provided.  As well as casework and a weekly Food Club.  Alternatives provides free counselling, parenting and life skills support, a Baby Bank, and skills development to help women support their families. A new cleaning social enterprise aims to diversify income and provide decent, flexible work.  Vitally, Alternatives provides a community where women support each other and know they can get help. A weekly parenting group was named ‘We Are Family’ by its first members, as none of them had any other family in the UK to support them.  How can we help this Christmas season?  We are holding a number of Toy Collection services, where we invite you to donate gifts for the children in the families supported by  Alternatives. These are very often the only presents they will receive, so we encourage you to treat them to new gifts, unwrapped, and avoiding anything which needs replaceable batteries, plus no guns please and no toys related to witchcraft or wizardry due to cultural issues.  You may also give donations direct through the Alternatives website.

You can bring toy donations to all services on Sunday 27 November or St George’s  Reception at any point until the end of Tuesday 29 November. A mother supported by Alternatives said: ‘Thank you so much, last year I found old toys that had been thrown out to give to my children, I can’t afford to buy them anything, it all has to go on food.’ As well as helping in this practical way, please also pray for the Alternatives Trust particularly:· 

for a resolution to their premises issue, as they have to move out of the building by October 2023 because it is being sold. They are currently looking for an alternative home to base the charity. 

· for staff who are under cost-of-living pressures themselves and still supporting others.

· for the pressures on families they support because of rising costs.

for children who are living in temporary accommodation, hotels and B& Bs, that they will grow up knowing they matter and that they are loved. More info:  www.altel.org.uk