What is the CAB?
Beginnings
The network of Citizens' Advice Bureaux was established at the outset of the Second World War. The government recognised that war would be a time of dislocation and hardship, with information hard to come by. CABs were therefore set up to provide help at a time of national crisis. The Service has continued and expanded since because the need for advice has grown enormously, much of that need due to the complexities of living in a modern advanced society.
Now the CAB Service is the world's largest independent advice-giving agency, and enjoys the respect of all the statutory bodies, even though it can be a thorn in their sides at times. Governments consult Citizens' Advice (CA), as the national umbrella organisation is known, when new legislation is being proposed, Citizens Advice itself regularly draws attention to problems which come to light in bureaux across the country, and its senior staff frequently appear on TV and radio consumer and welfare programmes.
The aims of the Citizens' Advice Bureau are:
- To ensure that individuals do not suffer through lack of knowledge of their rights and responsibilities or of the services available to them, or through an inability to express their needs effectively and equally.
- To exercise a responsible influence on the development of social policies and services, both locally and nationally.
- To provide independent, free, confidential and impartial advice to everybody, regardless of race, gender, sexuality or disability.
What kind of advice is given?
It is almost impossible to list all the topics or problems CABs deal with. Here are just four examples.
- A woman has just been dismissed from her job. She was given no warning, but thinks it was because she complained about one of the senior staff harassing her. Can she claim unfair dismissal?
- A man comes in with a letter from the Child Support Agency, requiring him to pay a monthly amount to his ex-wife who has care of their children. She left him for another man and is now comfortably off. He is on his own, and although he wants to support his children, was not expecting to have to pay so much. Can he do anything about it?
- A woman who was receiving Disability Living Allowance for a bad back has just been informed that it will no longer be paid because she is now judged to be fit. Yet, when she goes to the Job Centre, she is told that there are no jobs for her because she cannot stand for any length of time nor lift anything. What can she do?
- A man has recently been made redundant. He has a large mortgage, credit card debts, a bank loan and goods being bought on mail order. He cannot afford the repayments out of his JobSeeker's Allowance, and his redundancy pay was very small. He and his wife are at their wits' end to know what to do. Threatening letters are being sent to them and they are afraid of losing their home. Can the CAB help them?
These cases are typical. The range, though, extends to include consumer, health and housing problems. A case can simply be a request for information, such as a telephone number or an address, or it can raise multiple problems requiring negotiations and dealings with government departments and agencies, utilities, employers, landlords, credit companies and banks. Often an adviser has to look beyond an initial question by a client to find out what is really the problem behind it.
Abingdon and District CAB is affiliated to Citizens' Advice. CA is responsible for supplying the comprehensive body of information which is at the heart of the work of bureaux throughout the country, for training volunteer advisers and for ensuring high standards. For more information, you may like to go to the CA Web Site by clicking on Citizens' Advice