A little Norfolk Citizens Advice history…
Our work is built on a long history of Citizens Advice services in Norfolk.
The service started life on the first day of the Second World War as a planned response to disruption expected by the coming war. Communities worked together to open more than 200 bureaux in the next few weeks, opening in post offices, garden sheds, pubs, and, eventually, bombed-out buildings. Advisers dealth with problems relating to the loss of ration books, homelessness and evacuation. They also helped locate missing relatives and prisoners of war.
Pictured left is the first mobile CAB service issued 1941 - A horsebox. This was able to travel to areas affected by the blitz to help those most in need.
Nowhere was this sense of community felt more than Norfolk. Opening originally in the Norwich libraries, the service was quickly made available at Docking, King’s Lynn town hall, Holt, Thetford, Great Yarmouth town hall and Gorleston. Volunteers carefully noted down each client’s details and issues, advised as best they could, and fed back difficult questions to the Whitehall.
Clients unable to reach the offices could write to a volunteer correspondent who would try and assist by letter. Volunteers in Costessey, Dereham, Fakenham, Great Yarmouth, Long Stratton, Wisbech, Walsingham and Wells offered their services freely to all.
By 1945, services in Norfolk were supporting 3,000 clients each year and became a vital institution in post-war reconstruction. Our demand has changed but the essence of the service as described in 1943, remains:
“It’s universality is the great advantage of the Citizens Advice Bureau...many regard the work as easy or superficial. Nothing could be further from the truth. The patience and sympathy required even more than the information and wisdom, make it an exhausting job.
I mention all this because it is difficult for anyone to appreciate it without being in the bureau for several days and listening to all that is going on.”
For more on the history of the National Citizens Advice service, visit their website here.
