Case Study

Community Language Support Services Helping Hand

Organisation: 

Community Language Support Services (CLSS)

Cloudesley grants: 

2024: £52,500 (£17,500 per year for three years) from the Principal Grants Fund

2023: £10,000 Small Grants Fund

About the Organisation: 

Community Language Support Services (CLSS) aims to reduce poverty, isolation and social exclusion through providing a range of valuable services to help improve the quality of life for refugees, asylum seekers and others who are disadvantaged. They help clients to access mainstream services as language differences can be a barrier to accessing services. CLSS provides services such as advice, information and advocacy, and offers face-to-face meetings or outreach visits to clients’ homes. They also assist with accessing health services, education and referrals to specialist agencies in areas such as immigration.  They assist speakers of community languages with limited English language skills to communicate with local organisations.

CLSS mainly work with Black minority ethnic and refugee communities from East Africa and other Arabic speaking communities in Islington and neighbouring London boroughs.

Project Funded  

 The grant supports Community Language Support Services’ Helping Hand project, funding a health support worker to deliver monthly health awareness workshops and one to one support sessions to help local people in need in Islington to improve their physical, mental, and social well-being. Additionally, CLSS delivers advice, advocacy and support in the client’s first language as well as successfully helping clients to access the services and benefits they are entitled to. In the first year of the grant, they delivered 12 gender-specific health awareness workshops in partnership with Healthwatch Islington, where approximately 30 people attended each one. CLSS has continued to deliver their women’s self-help group fortnightly as well as visiting the homes of vulnerable isolated individuals. Also, 25 volunteers continued to provide befriending services to housebound individuals under CLSS’ supervision and support.
Impact of Project

CLSS reports that they have reached some of the hardest to reach vulnerable members of Islington, with more people accessing services and benefit entitlements. They report that in the first year of this grant (2024-2025):

  • 95% of applications on welfare benefits cases were successful without need for appeals.
  • 100% of immigration cases were successful, with financial support offered for applications for children’s citizenship to reduce strain for families.
  • 85% of those who accessed the service reported improvement to their financial and health wellbeing.
  • Over 60 clients reported becoming more confident in accessing online services independently.
  • Working relationships with the statutory, voluntary and supporting agencies have strengthened.
  • 357 isolated people have been reached and supported – 200 of these were women with caring responsibilities.
  • Women’s self-help group has continued to grow, bringing diverse women together and developing supportive relationships.
  • 491 people with disabilities have been supported and greatly benefited from the service.

What the group says 

Before accessing our service, many clients reported significant challenges: difficulty communicating, confusion about processes, limited awareness of available services, and high levels of anxiety when navigating the UK system. Clients consistently describe our support as vital, culturally appropriate, and often unavailable elsewhere. Many shared that they struggled to find help in their own language or from providers who understood their lived experiences.

The Cloudesley perspective – why did this project gain support? 

CLSS is a well-established community led organisation. It was felt that this project had the potential to have significant impact and to reach communities and individuals that other services do not reach or support. As such, the project was a strong fit for the Fund’s focus on addressing health inequalities amongst people experiencing multiple disadvantages.