The number of construction industry families benefiting from financial support rose to 2,616 during the year (up from 1,662 in 2018), with a total of 拢703,641 of charitable giving to support them.
Altogether, Lighthouse paid out 拢1.13m in charitable donations in 2019 鈥� a slight decrease on the 拢1.25m provided in 2018. However, 2018 was up 75% on 2017.
The 2019 total includes 拢411,962 on the charity鈥檚 education and training programme, training 300 mental health first aid instructors in conjunction with the Construction Industry Training Board. These instructors in turn have trained more than 3,000 mental health first aiders to provide 鈥榖oots on the ground鈥� support for the UK鈥檚 construction workforce.
A little over 拢21,000 has been invested in the Construction Industry Helpline App, which provides information on wellbeing issues.
Bill Hill, CEO of the Lighthouse Construction Industry Charity, said: 鈥淲e are working tirelessly to ensure that our construction workers and their families have access to the help they need. Our helpline cards have now been distributed to almost 600,000 of our workforce and our app has been downloaded over 20,000 times.
鈥淲e will continue to deliver pro-active interventions to ensure that situations do not reach a life critical stage and our mission is to ensure that no worker feels alone in a crisis. To support our helpline, we have recently introduced professional caseworkers who ensure that applicants receive all the possible support available to them, both from us and other organisations. This means that the charity is spending less per case whilst delivering a more holistic and higher quality service.鈥�
Got a story? Email news@theconstructionindex.co.uk
