A Blackburn charity has been chosen to receive funds for a project aimed at helping individuals and the community who may be suffering from gambling addiction or gambling related harms.
IMO charity will get cash from the GambleAware Community Resilience Fund which was launched in response to the cost-of-living crisis to help reduce health inequalities in the most disadvantaged communities.
According to GambleAware, research indicates that people in more deprived areas are three times more likely to experience gambling harms compared to those in the least deprived communities.
And now they have sought to provide funding that specifically targets minoritised and marginalised groups to enhance the support they receive and ensure they have access to the right help and guidance to address gambling.
Organisations were invited to submit their applications for a grant of up to £100,000, which would allow them to assist their affected communities through education and awareness raising, and providing treatment, interventions, or other support.
The GambleAware funding programme will see £1.24m given to 22 organisations across Great Britain to support individuals and communities affected by gambling.
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They support people from South Asian communities who are experiencing gambling harms due to the cost-of-living crisis by providing advisors through pop-up services, mental health support, and delivering multilingual campaigns, among other activities.
Mohammed Sidat, IMO Charity Chief Executive Officer, said: “The opportunity for this comes at a great time where we can help and aid the community in an approachable and positive way through meaningful social impact.
“COVID has exacerbated the issue of financial implications along with the cost-of-living prices.
"The fund will allow us to support the BAME community (black and minority ethnic) to break the stigma around gambling related harms.
“This will enable us to raise awareness through education and build confidence thorough having open conversations in regards to this topic and the support available.”
IMO have used the fund to set up a new programme Solution Gambling Awareness to help individuals and the local community who may be suffering from gambling addiction or gambling related harms.
The new programme will offer residents in Blackburn group and one to one sessions, guiding residents to support services, private and confidential support and assistance, help to improve mental well-being, provide assistance on peoples road to recovery and much more.
Mohammed said: “Gambling is a sin in the Muslim community and due to that, what has been happening is it has become a bit of a taboo subject for the ethnic communities to discuss gambling.
“And we have had a lot of case studies and a lot of people coming to us through grass root organisations in the town saying that they are suffering domestic abuse or their partner or someone in their family is unfortunately addicted to gambling and due to that there is no real support or help or not feeling comfortable enough to go out to ask for help.
“Hence why when we saw this opportunity to go to and apply for a fund, and if we were successful, we could run a meaningful programme for the local residents of Blackburn with Darwen.
“So this is how we started and applied for this fund which was successful and now we are now hoping to deliver this programme.”
Mohammed said himself and the team feel happy that they have been selected to receive the funding.
He said: “We feel quite happy and privileged to that our application was accepted because so many applications went to them [GambleAware] and the assessors saw the need of this programme and they understood what we were trying to achieve.
“I feel really privileged and proud that we were successful to get this, and I now hope that can support the people who are in need of this help.”
If anyone in Blackburn with Darwen needs any gambling help and advice, people can call the free number, 0800 093 1335.
For more information go to https://www.imocharity.org/home/
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