We rely on support from so many individuals to help make our projects possible. Browse the links on the left to see how you can volunteer or donate and help to make a real difference in our community.

What we could really do with right now, is for a dozen or more local people to offer to help us by becoming volunteer cooks! Could you be a volunteer, coming once a week or once a fortnight? Residents’ eating together is great for building a sense of community, and if someone could cook for the residents whilst they are trying to sort their lives out attending courses and treatment centres, it would be such a great help.

Like other organisations, the Spitalfields Crypt Trust is facing challenges this year. Amongst all the news about important local services being cut, comes the news that our extremely successful and popular project for homeless men with alcohol and drug problems is to lose 100% of its funding from Hackney Council, at the end of March 2011, totalling £190,000.

This is a devastating blow, both for us as an organisation and for the people who might have come into this project in the next year or two.

Acorn House accommodates 16 people and is full 95% of the year and often has a waiting list of five or six people. People are referred from all the main homelessness and drug/alcohol services across London, so it is a valuable project.

From Acorn House men can move to another house we have in Hackney, and in 2009, 93% of the people who left that house moved into independent accommodation, about three years after coming into Acorn House. That is a fantastic success story. Recovery that will stand the test of time takes time to achieve, but if it leads to permanent change, it is worth every penny.

The Spitalfields Crypt Trust has been established as a practical organisation for 45 years. In the last 10 years we have spent over £1 million setting up fantastic services in Hackney for people with alcohol and drug problems. It is tough however, and it will get tougher, but we will not be giving up!

Despite running hugely successful and sought-after services, the future of small organisations such as our own looks challenging. The relatively new contract culture means that only large organisations with the capacity to produce acres of paperwork, policies and procedures will survive or thrive in the coming years.

We will continue to provide a service at Acorn House and we will find a way to do that, but it will be hard. For more information please click HERE