A Brief History
wintercomfort was founded and developed by Henry Rothschild, a Cambridge businessman who had increasing concerns about the City’s (ever growing) homeless population. Henry, with a small band of volunteers, started to collect clothing and blankets for rough sleepers.
The next step was to acquire a bus from which hot drinks and food were handed out from the City’s Lion Yard car park. Soon Cambridge’s first winter shelter was established.
wintercomfort became a registered charity in 1991, employed its first staff members in 1992 and in 1993 purchased its current premises Overstream House on Victoria Avenue, Cambridge.
Downstairs there was a day centre, named “The Bus”, after the old mobile bus in the Lion Yard. We offered shelter, food, drink, showers, laundry, GP surgery and veterinary service. Over the next few years the services in “The Bus” came and went depending on funding, or the lack of it.
However, the Bus was not the only service wintercomfort provided. For several years it took the lead on winter shelter provision, working in partnership with other local organisations such as Cyrenians and English Churches Housing Group. In addition, supported housing projects were started in Cambridge, Ely and Uttlesford District. These projects negotiated tenancies with private landlords for wintercomfort clients, providing support to both landlord and client. As part of the supported housing projects, a number of “Bridge Houses” were rented in Cambridge and Ely.
From very humble beginnings, wintercomfort very quickly became a sizeable organisation. In May 1998, the then Director, Ruth Wyner, and Manager, John Brock, were arrested on suspicion of "knowingly allowing the dealing of Class A drugs on the premises" and were eventually imprisoned for terms of five years and four years respectively. A very strong campaign against their convictions was raised. Their case became nationally famous and they were labelled “The Cambridge Two”. Many other homelessness agencies throughout the UK feared for their staff in light of what happened at wintercomfort and everywhere drugs policies were examined and reviewed.
Ruth and John appealed against their convictions and although their appeal was not upheld, they were released from prison on 11 July 2000.
Bewildered and shaken to the core by what had happened, the organisation could easily have gone under. It was attacked by individuals, by some of the media and it lost major funding commitments. The Board of Trustees stood by Ruth and John and together with the staff team, fought to keep wintercomfort going. They were supported by many individuals who wrote to wintercomfort and who donated money to show the faith they had in the organisation. However, wintercomfort suffered in financial, organisational and emotional terms.
A period of cut-backs and mergers ensued because of the dire financial position wintercomfort found itself in as a result of the court case, the publicity and the doubts of the funders. It was hard on the clients, the staff who had to leave and those who stayed. Bit by bit wintercomfort picked itself up and dusted itself off. Having managed to keep afloat financially, by the second half of 2001, it was decided it was time to start looking to the future.
A planning process took place involving Clients, Staff, the Board, Volunteers and some external organisations that resulted in the Development Plan 2002-2005.
During 2002 “The Bus” was completely refurbished and renamed as “The Centre”. The previous drinking yard was turned into a peaceful and pleasant container garden and several work rooms were created. The Centre is now an inviting, light and modern environment. The biggest change of all has been the new ethos:
Helping clients to take “the next step” towards reintegration into mainstream society.
We do that by not only providing for basic human needs of shelter, warmth, food, clothing and hygiene facilities but by offering a range of other services such as counselling, numeracy, literacy, life skills tuition and many more.
Since it re-opened in September 2002 The Centre no longer allows alcohol to be consumed on the premises, and in fact, most clients voted in favour of this decision. We still welcome intoxicated clients on the condition that they behave in accordance with the code of conduct that was drawn up by both clients and staff. Drugs of any description are not allowed on the premises.
In December 2006 the service was reorganised in order for every client to be allocated a Key-worker, to help them with planning the rebuilding of their lives. The drop-in element now opens for three hours every day. The emphasis has now moved from simply providing support to enabling people to move forward.
We are extremely proud of the services we now offer.
wintercomfort is always in need of donations to assist our work. Please click here to see how you can help.