Home-Start History and Development
Home-Start UK was founded in Leicester in 1973 by Margaret Harrison, whose vision of providing a voluntary organisation to provide help and support by parents to parents and families came to fruition with initial funding from The Winston Churchill Memorial Trust and Leicester Council for Voluntary Service.
In the early years professionals, such as social workers and health visitors, became aware of the difference the Home-Start approach was making to the families it supported, and so the scheme was able to expand with financial help from "official" sources.
From 1977 onwards, every year saw at least one - and often several - new regional "Home-Starts" setting up. Each is self-financing - funding is not provided by Home-Start UK.
It was not until 1990 that Home-Start Sudbury and District (as it then was) started, and in 1995, with an expanding geographical area of operation, became Home-Start Babergh. We later moved our base from Sudbury to our present offices in Hadleigh.
With a growing population throughout Babergh, the need for our special kind of help has grown, often beyond our capacity to meet it. We continue to recruit new volunteers but as they too need support from permanent staff, we need to generate the extra income necessary to fund growth. We are required to maintain the ratio of numbers of staff to volunteers within laid down parameters. Considerable energy has, therefore to be directed towards raising funds from local businesses, the public, and seeking grants from official sources.