As a way of helping the community with more than just a cheque, The Lancashire Foundation committee has decided to support 11 families in need.

The families will essentially be helped by the services of The Family Centre and the needs can range from all forms of abuse to providing them with a support network.

Several committee members of The Lancashire Foundation and Peter Carey, community programme director of The Family Centre sat down with The Royal Gazette to discuss why they donated the funding and what it will mean to families in the community.

The Family Centre's view was that helping relationships should be about more than just funding.

"Money by itself will not stop the problems that we have," said Mr. Carey. "It is about the power of awareness, partnership and strategy, and Lancashire is a funder (funding body) who really gets that and has that same thoughts and philosophies about where and how they give."

Lancashire Foundation donations committee chair Sarah Altman said that the relationship they are building with The Family Centre is in the interest of the whole community. "The work at The Family Centre is community based, with an attention to the support of children and families, in a multitude of ways," she said. "And that is of interest to committee members because we work with children in a multitude of ways, professionally."

She said committee members were keen to invest in an organisation which shares their same ideals.

The Family Centre provides programmes for intervention which range in length from 1-12 months and Lancashire Foundation is throwing its support behind these programmes.

The Family Learning Centre says it has found that at least one-third of the families it helps have chronic patterns of crisis. They need intervention in order to make lasting changes. This Family Centre offers helps through its Caring for Families Programme, which also requires the use of a family counsellor and a family support specialist.

"This services over 100 families a year and the idea is that these are vulnerable families of primary aged children," Mr. Carey said. "We provide a variety of services for them, whether it is one to 12 months and those interventions are not just counselling, but at getting at the family cycle that is creating the child's development, either in a healthy or negative way.

"It is to make changes at school, in the home, in the community depending on what is going on in the child's life. We are breaking the cycle and getting them on a new path that is going to work better for them so that they can sustain healthy lifestyles.

"The idea for The Family Centre is that we don't just make changes with children - children are our barometer for their environment, so you have to go back to the environment to make the change. There is a compassion for the child and we know that many children suffer and sometimes it is abuse or school dropouts, sometimes it is suicidal thoughts. We know that this is common among primary school kids - it's not at 90 percent, but it is common - and this is the kind of client that we attract.

"The challenge is therefore, that these kids are underprivileged and disadvantaged. Now these are words that we usually think of in relation to the Third World (developing nations) but here we are in one of the wealthiest countries in the world and we have that problem.

"And this is because the problem is not just something you can fix with money, it is something that is driven by what your family and environment is able to offer.

"And if what you need is emotional support and you can't get it from your school, or home, or community, than you are as in trouble as if you were in Bangladesh today."

Mr. Carey added: "I think Lancashire understood that and funded 11 families in our most intensive track, which is our 12 month programme.

"What was important to us was that the financial investment was needed to achieve it, but the reason for the partnership was about understanding what makes these kids disadvantaged and understanding that changing that and creating the advantage for these children is systemic.

"We are trying to make a cultural change, a social change that then impacts us all, whether you are a CEO, a grocery clerk, or a parent, child or teacher - that you are involved in the social system that we all participate in.

"And that although we are working with individual families, we are shifting social dynamics that we all participate in.

"It is about stepping in and helping a child make sense of their life."

Mrs. Altman added that often the community asks questions like, why do these people have so many issues and, where was the intervention earlier.

"We hope to support charities and groups and we look for people and groups who have well researched and accredited methods, intervention tools, monitoring, progress and using empirically-based methods to dig in deep where the issues are," she explained.

"We feel very strongly about The Family Centre, because there are a lot of people who want to do good, and a lot of people that do good, but really getting the work done is important."

The Lancashire Foundation is a private trust, which was established through the Lancashire Insurance Company.

"The donation's committee is made up of an unusual composition of individuals - some are employees here, some aren't - some are volunteers."

Speaking on how the committee was compiled, committee member Anna Mathiason said everyone has an interest in the projects that they want to fund, which mainly surrounds education and supporting children.