Vineyard Compassion responds to the Northern Ireland Anti-Poverty Strategy Consultation
Last week, Vineyard Compassion submitted our response to the Northern Ireland Executive’s draft Anti-Poverty Strategy (2025). While we welcome its intention, we believe the strategy needs clearer plans, stronger commitments, and genuine partnership with the voluntary and faith sectors to deliver lasting change.
We see the impact of poverty every day through our foodbank, debt advice, wellbeing programmes, and support services and that’s why we felt it was vital to respond. Change is possible when government, charities, and communities work together.
The consultation is open until 19 September 2025, and we’re encouraging local charities, churches, and community groups to share their voice too.
Email your response to AntiPovertyConsultation@communities-ni.gov.uk to highlight your experiences, expertise, and the difference your work has made.
Our Response:
Introduction
Vineyard Compassion is a Coleraine-based charity that offers holistic, wraparound support to individuals and families experiencing poverty and crisis. With services including food support, counselling therapy, budgeting support, wellbeing programmes, and social enterprises, we operate at the frontline of poverty alleviation, serving thousands across the Causeway Coast and Glens each year. As a faith-based organisation, our approach is rooted in dignity, compassion, and hope - values we believe are essential to any serious attempt to tackle poverty.
We welcome the publication of this draft Anti-Poverty Strategy (APS) and the opportunity to respond. However, we are deeply concerned that the draft, while aspirational in tone, falls short of what is needed. Below we outline key areas for improvement, drawing on evidence and recommendations from experts and lived experience from people we serve on the north coast.
1. The Need for Tangible Commitments: Timelines, Funding, and Measurables
While the strategy speaks of ambition and intent, it lacks the tangible components necessary to instil confidence. There is no clear implementation plan, no defined budget or resource allocation, and no timeline or performance measures to track progress. This undermines the credibility of the strategy and risks further delay in addressing what is an urgent and growing crisis.
We echo the conclusion of the Northern Ireland Audit Office in its 2024 report on child poverty, which noted that “the absence of a comprehensive, resourced and monitored strategy has significantly hindered progress in reducing poverty levels” since the end of the Child Poverty Strategy in 2022. Without a detailed delivery plan, this strategy risks becoming another missed opportunity.
2. Grounded in Evidence: Expert Reports Must Be Reflected
We urge the Department for Communities and the Executive to fully incorporate the recommendations of the 2021 Expert Advisory Panel on Anti-Poverty, which outlined a clear and comprehensive roadmap for an APS in Northern Ireland. This included the need for legislation, a rights-based approach, a strong focus on structural inequalities, and an emphasis on prevention.
Likewise, NICVA’s 2022 recommendations, (which was developed by members of the original APS co-design group), offered detailed proposals on the structure and content of a robust strategy. These include the importance of co-design with those with lived experience, and the need for clear governance and accountability mechanisms. We regret that these important contributions are not reflected in the draft strategy and urge the Department to re-engage with those groups to co-produce the next iteration.
3. An Executive-Wide Responsibility
While we recognise the Department for Communities’ role in leading the APS, poverty is not confined to a single department. It touches education, health, justice, and the economy. This strategy must be a whole-of-Executive commitment, underpinned by cross-departmental accountability and resourced accordingly.
This is more than a policy exercise. It is a moral imperative. The Executive must demonstrate the political will to act collectively and urgently to reduce poverty in Northern Ireland.
4. Context Matters: Learn from Others, and Root It in Northern Ireland Reality
We are disappointed that the strategy fails to reference anti-poverty strategies from other devolved nations such as Scotland or Wales, where more integrated and well-resourced approaches have been adopted. There is much Northern Ireland can learn from these experiences.
Moreover, the strategy does not acknowledge the unique socio-political context of Northern Ireland, including the legacy of conflict, the divided nature of our communities, and the specific drivers of poverty here. A one-size-fits-all approach will not work. We need a strategy grounded in the lived reality of people in our towns, estates, and rural communities.
5. Recognising the Burden on the Voluntary and Community Sector
In the absence of an effective government response to poverty, the voluntary sector, which is largely powered by volunteers, has stepped in to fill the void. Organisations like ours have carried enormous weight, responding to growing need with limited and often insecure funding.
This model is not sustainable. Volunteers are exhausted. The community sector needs support, investment, and recognition - not just warm words. A credible strategy must outline how government will work in genuine partnership with the voluntary and community sector, including multi-year funding, collaborative design, and a commitment to capacity-building.
6. Faith in Action: A Unique Contribution Deserving Recognition
As a faith-based organisation, we bring a distinctive and holistic approach to tackling poverty. We offer practical and emotional support, but also spiritual care to those who want it. This holistic model reflects the Christian story of hope and courage - values that we believe are conspicuously missing from the current strategy.
We urge the Department to recognise the unique contribution of the faith sector, not only in service delivery but in shaping the moral and ethical framework of the strategy. Faith communities have long played a crucial role in caring for the most vulnerable. They must be supported and included in future planning and delivery.
See how faith covenants are working in other jurisdictions: https://www.faithaction.net/working-with-you/appg-on-faith-and-society/covenant/
Conclusion
This draft Anti-Poverty Strategy must go much further if it is to meet the scale of need in Northern Ireland. It must be backed by clear funding, measurable goals, and a timeline for delivery. It must be shaped by expert evidence, grounded in local context, and informed by the lived experience of communities and organisations like ours.
Above all, it must be courageous and hopeful, willing to confront the structural causes of poverty and invest in a better future for everyone.
We remain committed to working with the Department and the wider Executive to realise that vision. But we need leadership, partnership, and a strategy that is fit for purpose.
Signed,
Ricky Wright
CEO
Vineyard Compassion
September 2025