Ahead of this year’s UK Savings Week, we held a Parliamentary Reception to reach out to key stakeholders and build support for this year’s UK Savings Week.  With over 100 UK Savings Week champions and supporters gathering on the Terrace of the House of Commons and the subsequent buzz on social media, the week has kicked off to a great start.

The reception was kindly hosted by Gareth Thomas MP, and attendees at the event included UK Savings Week partners, supporters, charities, those working on financial resiliency, and of course Parliamentary friends.

On the evening, there were a range of speeches from four speakers, including Robin Fieth (Building Societies Association Chief Executive), Tulip Siddiq MP (Labour Shadow Economic Secretary to the Treasury), Gareth Davies MP (Conservative Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury) and Marlene Shiels OBE (Chief Executive, Capital Credit Union).


Robin Fieth (BSA CEO) spoke about the news that 1 in 7 UK adults (almost 8 million people) who have no savings at all. But the research also found that a third of those without savings are confident they could afford to start saving regularly – really positive news!












Tulip Siddiq MP, and Labour Shadow City Minister, spoke about challenge of saving during the current cost of living crisis and growing the building society and credit union sector to help support people become more financially resilient.












While Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury, Gareth Davies MP, highlighted the cross-party support for the issue and the importance of financial education to help people feel in control of their money. As part of this, he shared the example of the Junior Newbury Building Society Branch project where junior school pupils are in charge of running their own branch and learn about managing money.











Marlene Shiels OBE (Chief Executive, Capital Credit Union) spoke about the importance of building a savings habit and the experience of her credit union. They had run a project to encourage people to save and join the credit union and 12 years later they were continuing with that savings habit.












During the evening people had fun speaking to the different stands, hosted by Yorkshire Building Society, Coventry Building Society, UK Savings Week and Stepchange, and using the social media props to create a buzz online.



Thanks go to everyone who has supported the event and has contributed to kicking off UK Savings Week this year with such a buzz.
 

Find out more on the UK Savings Week website and you can also follow UKSW updates on social media:

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