The Michael Roberts Charitable Trust exists to serve the needs of the people of Harlow and surrounding areas. Our interventions build confidence, increase resilience and generate hope through upholding people’s dignity: when in crisis, overlooked, isolated, or facing long-term hardship.

We do this through:

1. Working in supportive partnership with all local voluntary and statutory bodies
2. Redistributing food & children’s items from neighbours and businesses to those in need
3. Hosting drop-in centres for anyone needing friendship and social support
4. Advocacy and campaigning on behalf of those we serve
5. Mobilising helpers across the town

Our work results in:

1. An immediate response to hunger for anyone who asks
2. Crisis resilience: a quicker return from crisis back to stability
3. More robust households in periods of misfortune
4. More secure early years for families in hardship
5. Increased belonging, confidence and hope for those vulnerable to exclusion or isolation
6. Generating empathy and solidarity for those overlooked in the wider population
7. Challenging the boundaries of what is tolerable in a wealthy, civilised nation
8. Stimulating more action and innovation in support of those in need

MRCT as been operating for 24 years. Emerging out of the Harlow churches, we are a Christian charity promoting inclusion, unconditional acceptance, practical expressions of justice and love without boundaries of culture, creed, class or race.