As acting chief executive Mike Adamson explains, every crisis is personal, no matter where it strikes.
Some people may not be aware of the work you do in the UK. How does the Red Cross help people here at home?
The theme that unites our work in the UK and internationally is that every crisis is personal. We try to ensure that the Red Cross is ready to respond to a crisis whenever it happens.
We help people get back on their feet again.
Throughout the winter, particularly across the south of England, we were helping people after the terrible flooding and tidal surges. We helped more than 9,000 people through basic assistance in rest centres when they had to leave their homes, but also checking they are alright in their homes, always working in partnership with the local authorities. We are written into the local resilience plans and play a leading role in the voluntary sector. That is the core emergency work.
In what ways does the Red Cross support health and social care services?
We support people to get back on their feet again after a health and social care crisis, either to prevent an admission to hospital or support them after a discharge from hospital. We help people in A&E for example, particularly old people who lack friends or family. Even though they are clinically well enough to go home, a doctor or nurse will be so concerned about the situation that they will end up admitting them.
We work in partnership with a clinical commissioning group or a hospital trust to help prevent people being admitted to hospital unnecessarily.
If we have our volunteers or staff in the A&E department then we can work alongside the clinician, help do the risk assessment and get the person home, arrange the transport, if they need a wheelchair or commode we can arrange that. We can arrange to sit with them at home, make sure they have food in the fridge and that the central heating is on, and then follow up with visits or phone calls afterwards.
It is a win-win-win. It is a win for the patient, because most people would prefer to be at home. It is a win for the CCG or hospital as they save on the cost of the admission, and it is a win for us because we get to do what we do.
Additionally we provide first aid training which helps people deal with an everyday crisis when someone has a heart attack or stroke.
Increasingly we are targeting that first aid training at people who would otherwise be in an A&E because they did not know first aid. It is all about reducing the impact of crisis by helping people be better prepared but also to get people back on their feet when there is a crisis.
We have also played an important part in the recent drafting of the Care Bill on the importance of prevention activity and the responsibilities of local authorities to assess the needs of people for prevention so that people don’t unnecessarily spend time in hospital. We are trying to work with the Department for Health and local authorities to try to build up an evidence base about what works.
How many volunteers deliver these services?
We have around 30,000 volunteers across the UK who work both in our crisis services and in our shops. About two thirds are service volunteers.
We run first aid training, a social enterprise which is helping fulfil a charitable purpose, but runs a surplus that we also reinvest into our services.
What sort of work does Red Cross do with asylum seekers in the UK?
We help them to find their way round the system so they can access a GP, how to use the bus service, try to find accommodation and indeed know how to apply for asylum. Increasingly we are trying to build an evidence base from the support we provide, so that we understand through our own research and learning. What are the things that are making people more vulnerable?
In our work with asylum seekers we have been working to help government understand a bit more about where the system is failing even in its own terms.
The way in which family reunion support is handled, for example, creates unintentional consequences. The forms are inappropriate. People need legal advice to navigate through the system. We have found that even in some of those more controversial areas if the evidence is presented in a neutral, impartial way, we can show how the situation can be improved, government is quite receptive to that.
Do you feel MPs and peers are aware of your work?
Historically the Red Cross has not been an organisation that has campaigned and we do not see ourselves as a campaigning organisation. But increasingly our voice, and the learning from our operational experience, is relevant. We have had a very good reception from MPs and ministers that we have approached about what works and what does not. I think what they have appreciated is that we are not sensationalised in the way we approach that. We simply talk about what works. That stays true to our mandate as an impartial organisation but also helps government by showing how things can be done better.
Do you feel that work isn’t as well recognised?
We want to do more in influencing parliamentarians in the Commons and the Lords and indeed ministers and senior civil servants to make them more aware of what we are doing and the difference we make, but always trying to anchor our recommendations in operational experience.
It does not mean we would never go public in what we have to say. In seeking to influence the inclusion of first aid in the school curriculum, we did engage some of our volunteers in sending postcards into MPs, and that was part of raising awareness. But that remains the exception; most of it is through private meetings and building coalitions and partnerships with others in the sector that have similar experiences.
We have done some very effective lobbying alongside UNHCR, for example, on the forms that enable someone to secure family reunion for asylum seekers.
What sort of ‘unintended’ problems happen in the asylum system?
We are building an evidence base on our work with refugees – often when they are given asylum status their problems are just beginning. Their asylum support comes to an end and it can take six to eight weeks for them to receive a national insurance number which enables them to work or claim benefits. Therefore they can end up unintentionally destitute in that period. We are trying to highlight what is happening in the system and being realistic about what politicians can do to change it.
With international disasters, how important is public awareness in raising money?
The reality is there are many neglected crises around the world that are not getting support in places like South Sudan and the Central African Republic, and our job is to help highlight those. With Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines we were able to raise over £20m, and it was very high profile. Our appeal for South Sudan has only raised £11,000 and yet hundreds of thousands are being displaced and hundreds are being killed.
This is
Red Cross Week. What sort of events are being held to raise funds?
Red Cross Week is a week once a year when we have an opportunity to remember the foundations of the Red Cross – we have been going for 150 years – and to raise our profile and raise funds and awareness. We have lots of events, from Red Shoe Walks to coffee mornings to baking events to simple collections. It is great fun for everyone who gets involved and a really important part of our year.
How is the Red Cross in the UK funded?
We have a mixed economy in funding. We are very fortunate to have around half a million people that donate every month, which is our lifeblood. That helps us to be ready to respond to emergencies small and large both in the UK and overseas. We also have legacies, a shops programme; we have several hundred shops that generate a surplus that we reinvest back into our services.
Finally, the crisis in Syria has dropped off the news agenda. What is the current situation on the ground?
The Syrian Arab Red Crescent remains the largest biggest provider of support, of food and medical assistance, and what we have been calling on all parties to do is ensure humanitarian access for aid workers to provide support across Syria to all groups. As we have seen from the tragic scenes from places like Aleppo, that is actually incredibly difficult. More than 30 Arab Syrian Red Crescent volunteers have been killed during the course of the conflict. They risk their lives every day so it is really essential that the British government, the EU and all parties call for the right to provide impartial help and provide safe access to all parts of Syria so we can do our job.