Thursday 30 December 2010

Asda Foundation helps transform derelict building

With Kids were delighted to recently accept a cheque for £13,855 from Asda Foundation. This fantastic grant will help us to transform what was a previously derelict building at 15 Annfield Place into a fully equipped Drop-In centre for children and families in the East End of Glasgow.

The Asda Foundation supports local causes nominated by Asda colleagues which helps to make a huge difference to the local community. The Asda Foundation was set up to give something back to the community and is UK wide.

This will make a tremendous difference to our work and we are hugely grateful to Asda Foundation.






Thursday 16 December 2010

Kids freeze in their own homes...in Glasgow

A Glasgow-based charity which helps some of the city’s most vulnerable children is calling on gas and electricity suppliers to help ease fuel poverty.

With Kids is working to ensure that families at this time of year can help meet their fuel bills.

The charity seeks to help very vulnerable children from some of Glasgow’s most deprived communities and their families overcome the effects of alcohol, drug abuse and domestic violence to ensure they get a decent start in life.

Research has shown that thousands of families struggle at this time of the year simply to ensure that their homes are heated. Many will go without food and Christmas gifts for their children in a desperate fight to keep their homes lit and heated.

If a family gets into arrears with their fuel payments their supplier can grab up to 70% of these payments to pay off the arrears. That means only 30p in every one pound spent goes into heating the home.

With Kids, Business Development Manager, Angela Beattie said: “At this time of year a distressingly high number of families and their children are at risk of freezing in their own homes because they simply cannot afford to heat them. And the winter we are currently experiencing is causing real material hardship for the most vulnerable in our city.

“We have also found that hundreds of families will be unable to provide their children with Christmas gifts because they scraped together what little they have to prevent their gas and electricity supplies being turned off. And although families with children under the age of five will rarely have their supplies stopped they find it impossible to struggle free of their fuel debt and will go without food to keep paying.

“One of the ways in which we try to help combat this is to organise a Christmas party on Christmas Eve with the help of Strathclyde Fire and Rescue. This year’s event at Calton Fire Station will see 200 families being given presents that they otherwise wouldn’t have. This means they have one thing less to worry about as they fight to pay the winter fuel bills.
“But the bigger issue remains: what are government and fuel suppliers, whose prices are set to jump again this winter, doing to ensure the most needy in our society can be helped.”

With Kids is one of the Evening Times Community Champions. This year’s Christmas Party will see poor kids experience for the first time what others take for granted. This will include a Christmas meal, games and a visit from Santa Claus. The Calton firefighters will be on hand to give the children rides on the fire engines and they’ll host the party.

For those who want to donate cash or gifts to help pay for the With Kids Christmas Party please contact Angela Beattie on:

Telephone 0141 550 5770 or e mail a.beattie@withkids.org.uk

You can also donate on line by visiting www.justgiving.com/withkids

Written by Kevin McKenna, The Word Agency. Email kevin@wordagency.net

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Wednesday 15 December 2010

With Kids Christmas Appeal 2010

Christmas is a special time of the year. At no other time are children exposed to so many pictures of happy families and gift-laden homes.

Yet for many children, such images are merely a pipe dream, owing to poverty, family breakdown and illness. For them, Christmas is simply another day devoid of the joy and warmth that the rest of us take for granted.

On Christmas Eve this year, ‘With Kids', is staging an alternative Christmas for children and their families in Glasgow’s East End. These are families who may otherwise struggle to provide any sort of Christmas for their children.

We want to provide a special day that will include games, a festive dinner and presents from Santa.We also want to ensure that these families all have sufficient clothing, heat, food and support over the period so that they can experience something of the joy that Christmas brings to the rest of us.

We are in desperate need of donations and support to enable this to happen.

£5.00 provides a goody bag at our christmas party
£10.00 pays for lunch for four at our christmas party
£20.00 fills a christmas stocking
£30.00 provides food for a family of four or winter clothing

We recognise that every donation is an extrordinary act, but it would allow these children and their families simply to enjoy a normal Christmas.

For info on how to donate, whether it be gifts, money or time then please email info@withkids.org.uk





Thursday 9 December 2010

The "With Kids" Santa has lost his Sleigh - Can anyone help?


The "With Kids" Santa has lost his sleigh! We urgently need a 4x4 to deliver food, winter clothing and toys to vulnerable children and families in the East End of Glasgow. We need the vehicle for the run up to Christmas.

As you know, many families that we work with don't have enough money to pay for gas, electricity, adequate winter clothing and basic food items to keep their children warm and well fed over the festive period. For many it can be a choice between keeping warm or not buying food items.

Buying presents are even more of an issue for many families and we know of at least fifty families that will not receive a main Xmas present unless With Kids provides it. Our commitment is to help as many families as possible. We really can make a difference to vulnerable children and families at Christmas in particular. Especially when the weather is so cold.

If you can donate a vehicle, please contact http://network.withkids.org.uk




Friday 3 December 2010

Secret East End venue that hosts the most important cinema night in Scotland

If today’s cinema goer is use to Multiplexes and the proud presentations at the start of movies that boast of the latest technology in sound and vision they might be surprised to hear about a rather unusual cinema hidden away in the East End of Glasgow, that offers a very low-tech viewing of movies.

It’s exactly one year since the East End charity With Kids opened the doors for their weekly cinema club. The idea was to reach out to families who struggle to afford to go to the cinema and for just £1 a family can watch a movie together in a basement at the With Kids offices.

For With Kids this is just one part of their intervention programme that reaches out to some of the poorest families in Scotland. These cinema nights help to bring families together and also encourage them to reach out to other families which has in turn has developed a strong support network

The cinema nights are voluntary but incredibly popular in the community and have resulted in several spin offs including an animation workshop for children at Wellshot Primary. The children on this workshop wrote, story boarded, produced and directed an animation film that has been made into a DVD.

With Kids is a very special charity designed to break the cycle of children growing up without the opportunity to go into work or extended study. This cinema night has shown that movies can bring people together and build and unite communities.