During these challenging times, Seafarers UK launched the UK Maritime Anchor Fund to support working age UK National merchant seafarers, impacted by COVID-19.
The Fund aims to address financial difficulties and their impact which can include strained personal relationships and impact mental health. Merchant seafarers can apply to the Fund if experiencing hardship caused by COVID-19.
According to Seafarers UK, experience hardship could be due to redundancy, difficulties renewing contracts, problems joining a ship due to travel restrictions, reduced earnings or COVID-19 related illness.
Grants are available to cover a significant reduction in income. The grant is just one part of a wide range of support which will enable a return to stability and financial resilience. It includes:
- Confidential personal advice on financial matters such as budgeting, income maximisation and access to eligible welfare benefits – provided by SAIL.
- Advice and help to tackle other related problems such as debt, tax and housing issues – provided by SAIL.
- Up to six sessions of free relationship counselling (referrals will be made by SAIL to Relate).
- Mental health and wellbeing support and counselling – provided by TogetherAll and funded by Seafarers’ Hospital Society.
Moreover, the charity informs that the fund is available to any working age, UK national seafarer experiencing hardship because of financial problems caused by COVID-19 regardless of rank or length of service.
UK Seafarer comments
Anyone in this category facing challenges because of COVID-19 is encouraged to contact SAIL to discuss their situation confidentially, whether the challenge is relationship difficulties or problems paying priority debts, the Fund will address a wide range of problems.
SAIL will assess entitlement for welfare benefits, and other needs. Where appropriate SAIL will make a grant application to Seafarers’ Hospital Society for financial support. The process has been refined to be as straightforward as possible to reduce admin and stress to applicants.
Seafarers UK has created the UK Maritime Anchor Fund with key delivery partner charities to provide an end-to-end package of support for seafarers experiencing financial hardship due to COVID-19 related loss of work or disruption of employment opportunities. Up to £200K has been allocated from Seafarers UK’s COVID-19 Emergency Fund, to support UK merchant seafarers, of working age, through the new UK focused fund, which can be accessed via Seafarers’ Advice and Information Line (SAIL).
Concluding, seafarers UK will launch a new strategy in early 2021, The UK Maritime Anchor Fund aligns with Seafarers UK’s new strategic outcome to enhance the financial resilience of seafarers, which forms part of the new strategy.
