As part of our annual budget setting cycle, West Berkshire Council undertake a consultation with residents to ensure all voices across the district are listened to.
Councils across the country continue to face unprecedented financial pressures, and West Berkshire Council is no exception. Post the COVID pandemic, Councils including West Berkshire have experienced a high inflation environment, resulting in increasing costs and rising demand on our social services supporting our most vulnerable residents.

For further information please follow the link to the survey 

Are you, or someone you know, struggling with the cost of essentials

West Berkshire Council has been allocated funding to help local households most in need with costs such as energy bills, food, clothing, and housing in exceptional circumstances.

The Household Support Fund can provide short-term financial help all for households in need; we are especially looking to assist families, the vulnerable, those living alone, pensioners, unpaid carers, care leavers, and disabled people.

Payments are set as a maximum for the following households:
• Family Household Plus Payment (3 or more children) - £300
• Family Household Payment (1 to 2 children) - £250
• Household Payment - £150
You will need to provide supporting evidence to meet the criteria for your application.

Get in touch and see how the Household Support fund could help you or someone you know. Apply online: www.westberks.gov.uk/householdsupportfund
Call: 01635 503944
or email: [email protected]
You can also apply in person at your local West Berkshire Library, or visit the Council Office on Market Street, Newbury.

Please note, you MUST provide the following or your application may be rejected:
• Declaration of household income and expenditure
• One full month (30 days) bank statement for all accounts
• Confirmation of any savings
• Recent utility bill or evidence of a West Berkshire address
• If you are applying for a family household payment, the number of children in the household must be evidenced, i.e. Universal Credit / Child Benefit
You MAY ALSO provide the following to support your application:
• Evidence of utility debts
• Other supporting documents relevant to your claim Your application will not progress without these documents

household_support_fund_24.pdf

Environment Agency update:

• Tributaries to Thames peaked and are starting to reduce. Water making its way into the Thames and still rising.
• Expecting smaller number of flooded properties spread over the Thames Valley.
• Deploying temporary barriers in South Hinksey (Oxfordshire).
• 5-10mm of rain is not expected to see additional flooding, just high rivers.
• Thames still rising (but rate of rise has slowed in Oxford).
• Thames is rising along its length and rising in Berkshire. Flood warning for River Thames in Abingdon. Not anticipating flood warnings on the Thames, but it may depend on the rain fall. To review overnight and once the rain has fallen.
• Jubilee flood only just started so has plenty of capacity
• Purley – EA Ops team have a plan in place and they don’t need support outside the normal plan.

Met Office update:

• A dry day throughout the day.
• Low pressure in southern UK overnight brining rain mid to late evening. Expecting 5-10mm of rail, isolated areas 15mm.
• Generally, a dry picture until Saturday. More unsettled into Sunday but unsure on what that will look like yet.
• No weather warnings in place for the Thames Valley. 

Do continue to keep up to date by checking: West Berkshire - flood alerts and warnings - GOV.UK (check-for-flooding.service.gov.uk) and monitoring the levels on the river by checking Find river, sea, groundwater and rainfall levels - GOV.UK (check-for-flooding.service.gov.uk)
For any out of hours emergencies call 01635 551111, for all other non-emergencies please report issues on Report a Problem - West Berkshire Council to be picked up the next working day.

Winter Payment "Phishing"
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We have been made aware of the start of criminal activity using both text messages and emails to try and steal bank details by playing on older people's concerns about the Winter Fuel Payment.
What is the Winter Fuel Payment?Winter Fuel Payment is an annual tax-free payment for households that include someone born on or before 22 September 1958 (for 2024-25) and, from 2024 onwards, receive Pension Credit, Universal Credit, Income Support, income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance or income-related Employment and Support Allowance, or an award of Child Tax Credit or Working Tax Credit of at least £26 for the tax year 2024-25. It's designed to help you cover your heating costs in winter, with households receiving up to £300. 
As you can see in the image on the right of a text message example, language is being used to make you more concerned and prompt you to tap or click the link in the message to "update your details." Unfortunately the link doesn't go to the UK Government website or anything to do with Winter Fuel Payments.
Initially it was a clone of the UK Government website designed specifically to encourage you to hand over your personal details - this is referred to as "Phishing" as the criminals are using the process to "fish" for your personal information by "dropping you a line" by text or email.
Fortunately the owner of the website space had software to detect such misuse of their webspace and it was taken down fairly quickly. However we expect this will keep happening with the fake website moving around the internet and being hosted on different machines across the world to evade action being taken against it.
Please be aware that these messages can arrive either as a SMS Text Message to your phone or as an email to your email account on your computer or your phone. This text actually originated from a phone number in Denmark, that was likely hijacked or cloned.
Clicking unknown links puts your information at risk, don't let the cyber-criminals get your information.