Volunteers deliver food and support to vulnerable
VOLUNTEERS at a community centre in Cardiff are providing support for keyworkers and vulnerable people during the pandemic.
Members of the Glenwood Church Community Centre in Llanedeyrn, funded by the National Lottery, have been working in partnership with a local independent coffee shop to deliver food to the most vulnerable in the community.
Their volunteers are also keeping the Cardiff Foodbank distribution centre in Llanedeyrn open and are working on a “buddy up” system, to ensure vulnerable people receive weekly telephone calls.
Highlighting the importance of the support to communities throughout Wales, John Rose, chair of the Wales National Lottery Forum and director of the National Lottery Community Fund in Wales, said: ”We have been amazed how community groups of all types have pulled together to help out in their communities.”
He added: “We want to reassure our communities that we are still here, we’re still making awards and we’d like to thank players of The National Lottery for their ongoing support, which is enabling us to make funding available to people and communities affected by the pandemic.”
Across the UK, charities and organisations affected by the coronavirus outbreak have been given access to a package of support of up to £600m from The National Lottery.
Millions of pounds of National Lottery funding will be distributed over the next few months in Wales alone to help projects most impacted by coronavirus.
While it is not yet known specifically which projects will receive the funding first, many National Lottery funded projects in Wales have already been adapting to the crisis as best they can within the parameters of social distancing.
Together with the Welsh Government, the Arts Council of Wales has been able to put £5.1m from National Lottery sources into a £7m Arts Resilience Fund for Wales.
The fund will provide support for arts funded individuals and organisations to help them through the coronavirus crisis.
The British Film Institute (BFI) has also made £4.6m of National Lottery funding available UK-wide to alleviate immediate pressure for organisations and individuals in the screen industries hardest hit by the pandemic, ranging from emergency funding for freelancers through to grants for audience-facing venues.
ON THE boarded-up doors outside Cardiff’s Fuel Rock Club are the words “we’ll see you soon” scrawled across in pen.
Like many industries, live music venues around the country have been hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic.
According to the Music Venue Trust there are currently 556 UK venues at risk.
For an industry that depends on people being close together on dancefloors and buying drinks at the bar, social distancing rules to tackle the outbreak were always going to be an issue.
And even before the pubs, clubs and bars were officially told to close, some worried for the safety of staff and customers, and took matters into their own hands and shut up shop.
But in the face of the financial hit being taken by grass-roots venues across Wales, there is now a lifeline – the Music Venue Trust (MVT) charity has launched a campaign that looks to raise money and awareness of the situation.
The charity’s Grassroots Music Venues (GMV) crisis fund has already raised more than £182,000, and now it’s set up #saveourvenues – a campaign aimed at artists, music fans and the wider music industry, that will see shares of the money raised split between venues “in crisis”.
One of the 556 venues on MVT’s list is Fuel Rock Club in the heart of Cardiff.
Rob Toogood, 48, has run the Womanby Street venue since 2006.
He said it’s been a “worrying” time for his business and the industry in general.
“We tried to stay open as long as we could,” Rob said. “They didn’t close the pubs, they just told people not to go to the pubs, which was a bit bizarre.”
Fuel ended up closing before the Government made the official ruling.
Rob said: “We started to feel uncomfortable asking our staff to carry on working but also asking our customers to come in.
“It came at a really bad time for all of us, really.”
Since the pubs have closed, Rob said they’ve been selling quite a lot of Fuel merchandise, including T-shirts and hoodies, as well as a compilation album of a lot of the live bands who have played at the venue. However, the venue does still have a lot of fixed costs, such as rent and insurances that still have to be paid. While his landlord has helped as much as possible, and commercial partners – such as breweries – are doing their bit, it was still a worrying time.
“We just don’t know how long this’ll last and we want to be ready to trade as soon as it’s safe to do so,” he said.
“It has been quite worrying. “We’ve worked with the Music Venue Trust for four years now and they’ve been a constant source of advice for us.”
MVT’s Save Our Venues initiative will see artists perform virtual gigs in support of their own local venue, chosen from the list of 556 currently deemed in crisis.
Each venue will have their own fundraising page with a target of money needed to stay afloat.
Excess donations will go to the central Save Our Venues fund to help the wider grass-roots music venue community.
Punk and folk singer Frank Turner has thrown his support behind the campaign.
The 38-year-old said: “The UK live music industry is staring into the abyss right now.
“I’m not able to save the whole thing on my own, but I decided to do a series of livestream shows to raise money for specific independent venues that I know and love, and that are in serious risk of disappearing right now.
“The success of these shows demonstrated the love that exists between music fans and their favourite grass-roots music venues, so the #saveourvenues campaign is a brilliant way of building on that and hopefully giving artists and music fans a chance to get involved and play a big part in helping them survive.”
Rob said: “This is the first time Fuel has ever done any sort of crowdfunding. We were waiting, in a way, until we really thought it was necessary.
“And having the Music Venue Trust’s campaign, making it nationwide – it’s a rolling project so bands and artists will get involved. We’ve raised over our target but it’ll go towards the central pot which will help all the venues around the country whenever they need it.
He added: “They always have been [a safety net for us].”
In Newport, Sam Dabb runs Le Pub, a live music venue that specialises in vegan food.
The 43-year-old explained that, luckily, her business can go down the deliveries route – however, not all are as fortunate.
“The crisis has seen venues across Wales cancel all live events and close