Everyone is impacted by the cost-of-living rising which can put extra pressure on families.

Connect Somerset – a partnership between Somerset Council, Somerset NHS, Voluntary, Community, Faith and Social Enterprises, Schools, Colleges and Early Years settings – is here to help.

The Somerset #Help4All offer is a collection of easy to access help, including lots of excellent services, online help and community resources, but not everyone knows how to access them. It’s only by helping more families access early help when they need it, that we can help them build their resilience and stop their needs escalating.

We’ve listed some of the most popular services and support that may be useful for you to know about.

Waste collection crews will be working this Saturday (9 December) in parts of South Somerset to catch-up on flood delayed collections.

The teams have been working hard to reach households following the flooding which hit parts of Somerset this week.

Crews have today (Friday), returned to villages in and around Somerton for recycling missed on Thursday. Some residents in and around Evercreech and Wincanton due to have their recycling collected today may have it delayed until Saturday.

Somerset Council is asking people to think about fixing as they gear up for the festive season.

According to Material Focus ‘Recycle your electricals’ campaign, 35 million of us admit to throwing away Christmas fairy lights when they are broken – enough to wrap round the earth nearly 12 times.

Think ahead and check your festive electricals – whether its fairy lights or neon Santas – before you put them up.

An essential bus service linking Wells to Weston-super-Mare will run again in the new year thanks to a partnership between North Somerset Council and Somerset Council.

The 126 service between Wells and Weston-super-Mare was discontinued in October 2022 due to low passenger numbers. Operator First West of England will run the service from Tuesday 2 January after winning a tendering process.

Somerset Council has been awarded £5m over five years by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) to form a Health Determinants Research Collaboration’ (HDRC) – a new research partnership to improve health and reduce health inequalities across the county.

The HDRC will see Somerset Council join forces with Spark Somerset, UWE Bristol and the Institute of Health Equity at University College London to enable the Council to make better decisions to improve health in Somerset, informed by existing evidence and new research and shaped by local people.

Somerset Council and NHS Somerset are teaming up to provide funding to care providers who want to go digital by introducing electronic care records which replace paper-based admin systems.

This project is in its second year running and has already helped over thirty care providers in Somerset to adopt a digital care record system.

Two new Deputy Lieutenants have been appointed to assist and support the Lord-Lieutenant in Somerset.

They are Brigadier Nigel Beacom QVRM TD VR DL, from Wedmore, and Justin Sargent OBE DL, from Ashwick. They bring to 34 the number of Deputy Lieutenants in Somerset, spread over a wide geographic area.

Two Somerset men have been awarded honours for services to their communities.

John Bishton, from Bruton, has received an MBE and Christopher Rutt, from Kilve, a BEM.

Both received their honours from the Lord-Lieutenant of Somerset, Mohammed Saddiq, during a ceremony at the Bishop’s Palace in Wells.

The Lord-Lieutenant thanked them both for their “enduring commitment to Somerset wellbeing, whilst scripting a story of progress, compassion and shared success.”