Salford UCRC - 0161 789 2999

Working with some of the most vulnerable people in society, the Centre is regarded locally as the fourth emergency service. Established in 1980, It continues its work today, campaigning, supporting, advising and representing unemployed and employed people

Salford Unemployed and Community Resource Centre (SUCRC) was formed in 1980 by the local community during a time of economic recession when there was a desperate need for self-help, information and advice on dealing with unemployment. That need still exists and SUCRC has stayed true to its original vision.

SUCRC offers a range of support services for our community, including older people, people with disabilities, unemployed people and workers who are facing difficulties. These include educational facilities, advice & representation for people facing problems in a wide range of fields. The Closing The Gap Project assists people with debt management, benefits information, basic literacy, numeracy skills and IT, confidence building, healthy living and CV writing. We also run Salford Prison Project which supports ex-offenders.



Salford is an area of acute economic deprivation; it has 47 super output areas in the 10% most deprived in the country. Unemployment is very high (9.6% compared with 7.7% average across the UK). 9 wards – over 40,000 households - are in the highest septile ranking for financial exclusion and a further 10 wards are in the next two: this means they score highly on indicators such as low income, outstanding borrowings, proportion of income spent on household fuel and access to affordable credit. Almost 60% of children in Salford live in poverty (Salford Council 2010 “Ending Child Poverty in Salford”). Many people in Salford lack qualifications, work experience and self confidence which makes it harder to find employment, especially during the recession.



SUCRC offers practical solutions to the issues local people face, for example through advice on benefits, links to credit unions and informal education sessions including community based workshops on subjects such as CV writing, English as a second language and confidence building. This helps tackle isolation and build community cohesion as we well as benefiting individuals and their families. We are embedded within our community and trusted by local people; we have been referred to as “the fourth emergency service”. Our holistic, people centred approach emphasising mutual aid, personal empowerment and practical action is key to our success. In the past 4 years we have supported around 25000 people within Salford.



We work in collaboration with a range of organisations that share our aim to support our community. These include statutory and voluntary organisations. This partnership approach is vital as it means we avoid duplicating existing work and our clients can access the fullest possible range of support as we all complement and collaborate with each other rather than compete. We are democratically organised and accountable to our members through our management committee. As well as our dedicated staff team, SUCRC relies on volunteers from within our community. Our Volunteers Charter ensures they are treated fairly.

Tags: Community Organization,Community Center