UK Mutual Aid/ Co-Care Project is still closed. We are yet to find a sustainable way to reopen that is able to support the workload of the admin, be safe and secure for the community as a whole, and navigate the ways in which social media, PayPal etc are constantly changing to be less user friendly and more restrictive. 

Whilst we are still closed you can check out these other linked projects:

Doulas Decolonising
https://doulasdecolonising.noblogs.org/

The Anima Print
https://www.theanimaprint.org/

NEUROMANCERS
https://www.neuromancersmagazine.com/

 

the intersectional support network for marginalised people in the UK
black run + activist-forward
founded december 2018

UK Mutual Aid was founded in December 2018 as the first online national mutual aid platform and was set up to facilitate support request for marginalised people across the UK. We have a Facebook group where the community exists and a Facebook page for people who want to get to know some more before joining.

What sets UK Mutual Aid apart from other groups is it's strong politics and roots in challenging societal norms and hierarchies. It gives an education on how to challenge privilege dynamics, redistribute wealth and the importance of personal reparations alongside the fight for state reparations.

"Separating money from mutual aid is classist, racist and oppressive."

As well as hosting the space for members, who fit the criteria*, to make financial and non-financial requests, UK Mutual Aid also runs a BIPOC Hardship Fund within the group and a Street Cash Hardship Fund distributed across the homeless, street worker and vulnerable community in Nottingham.
UK Mutual Aid as part of Notts Activist Wellness community care projects also works with a charity in Nottingham to provide a referral based fresh fruit and vegetable project for people with no recourse to public funds.

COVID-19 has brought many challenges and UK Mutual Aid adapted quickly with 5 COVID specific threads, including location based support, financial support, support for asylum seekers and refugees and more.

UK Mutual Aid is not a COVID-only group, unlike many who have appropriated our name. We have and will continue to support marginalised communties long before and after others decide it's not cool anymore.

"Pre-Covid-19, mutual aid was something to shun, something to ignore, something to attack and tear down, especially when run by Black people"

*the criteria for the group is strictly that white, cisgender and heterosexual people are not allowed to request. This is so that we can challenge the privilege that comes with those identities and open conversation into how privileged identities allow access that others are denied and the importance of platforming and prioritising marginalised people.