Care providers can apply for a small cash grant of £1200 per CQC registered location.   This grant can be used for backfill to release a member of staff to provide pastoral care to overseas recruits within their organisations

What is pastoral care?

International recruits very often don't know how life works in the UK.  By having a 'buddy' they can turn to within their organisation who can give them guidance on how things work in our country ensures that they feel welcomed and integrate more quickly.  Examples may be applying for driving licenses or signposting them to religious organisations

How will the scheme work?

In order to apply you must meet the following criteria:

• Be a CQC registered Adult Social Care providers with a CQC location within the local authorities mentioned above
• Have a valid Home Office Sponsorship license
• Have international recruits who have entered the UK within the last 12 months

Buddies will be required to attend a webinar hosted by the Care Association so that they are clear on what a buddy is and the sort of support they should be offering. Attendance is a mandatory element of the funding. Attendance of the webinar will trigger payment of the first 50% of your grant award.

As part of the application process you will need to supply us with contact details of some of the international recruits within your organisation.  Once a set length of time has occured, we will contact them to confirm that they have received support from the buddy.  Once this is confirmed, we will pay the remaining 50% of your grant.

All activities must be concluded by the end of June 2024

You will need to complete a short grant application form by clicking on the local authority button where you are located below (if you have more than one locality, you can make a separate application for each locality in any of the eligible local authority areas).   

We will also ask you to provide bank details for the payment.  This is so we can make the application and payment process as swift and simple as possible.

You must be:

Have a CQC location in any of the following local authority areas:

Birmingham

Dudley

Herefordshire

Sandwell

Walsall

Wolverhampton

Worcestershire

Have a current and valid sponsorship license for your locality

Be a CQC registered Adult Social Care Provider

Have international recruits who have entered the UK within the last 12 months

Funding is limited and on a first come basis.  Once the allocated funds for each authority are used up we will close applications in that area

Once we receive your application we will check that you meet the eligibiity criteria above. Once confirmed we will email your grant acknowledgement (which you will need to digitally sign) and send you a link to book your place on your webinar

All payments will be made by the end ofJune 2024

Click on the local authority your location is registered in. If you have multiple locations, please make a separate application for each one

This funding has been made available from the Department of Heath and Social Care and administered by WM ADASS.  West Midlands Care Association is acting as the fund administrators for this particular project