Dorset community groups receive funding for food support

With the recent freezing temperatures, Dorset Community Foundation together with BCP Council has at least been able to support community groups which provide hot meals.

The BCP Food and Energy Support Fund has distributed £275,000 allocated to the council from the government’s Household Support Fund. Almost 50 voluntary groups and charities have been supported with providing food boxes, community meals, cookery workshops, cooking equipment, shopping vouchers, warm spaces, employment support, debt advice and a range of other help.

Among the recipients is Bournemouth Community Church, which will use a £9,000 grant to provide families with fresh fruit and veg and meat vouchers and run its weekly Time For Tea community meals.

Community Engagement Pastor Andy Driscoll said families identified by the church’s food bank are invited in for a meal once a week, where its team get more of a chance to get to know and help them.

“We also have a number of wraparound support partners that work with us, such as Citizens Advice and Community Money Advice from Faithworks Wessex, and we have been very successful in helping people get housing, help with visa applications and all kinds of difficulties in their lives,” he said.

“Initially it was just a family meal, but then it turned into a bit of a community, so they’re all getting together and helping each other. We have one or two volunteers that come and do some games with the kids so the parents can get together as well.

“Our costs are high, so this grant is amazingly helpful.”

Christchurch Community Partnership will use its £5,600 grant to expand two weekly lunch clubs and a Sunday roast lunch for older people. Its club at Homelands in Christchurch attracts around 30 people a week but trustee Sandra Prudom said the club will bus in more people from Mudeford and Burton to grow the number to more than 45.

The group took over a lunch club at Greystones in Highcliffe last year and launched a weekly Sunday roast at Somerford ARC.

“The grant is essential because although we do charge for the lunches we try to keep it to a minimum so we don’t exclude anyone,” she said. “Everyone who comes along gets a nutritious balanced meal and also has the social interaction of meeting other people, which is just as important.”

Poole Food Bank+, which is run by Faithworks Wessex, received £9,400 and will use it to buy additional food stock to meet growing demand, low-cost cooking equipment such as air fryers and slow cookers and provide food and recipe bags for 1,300 people to ensure they get regular healthy meals.

Project Manager Ian Stoney said: “We will also use the grant to enhance our ability to host community meals, classes, activities and groups. We want to continue creating suitable safe spaces where clients feel confident to share enough with us to be able to assist them in the right way.”

Creative Kids in Boscombe received £4,215 to run a half-term holiday arts club for young people aged six to 14 who are entitled to free school meals, where they will be given a healthy breakfast, a hot lunch and cookery classes.