Friendship and fellowship can help reduce isolation in later life
A charity is aiming to offer the lifeline of friendship to 1000 older people who live alone in Scotland within the next year – including in east Perthshire.
Contact the Elderly organises free monthly Sunday afternoon tea parties in cities, towns and villages from the Borders to the Highlands.
In Perth and Kinross it has two groups, both in Perth, with a third in the pipeline for Blairgowrie. But it hopes that other parts of the district can also benefit.
Group members are collected by a volunteer driver and driven to a host’s home to meet with the rest of the party.
With 126 current groups across Scotland, increasing its guest list to 1000 would mean 30 new tea party groups with 250 additional volunteers.
By this time next year, Contact the Elderly hopes its tea parties will be enjoying an estimated 1000 litres of tea, 2000 sandwiches and 6000 sweet treats each month. Most importantly, the guests and volunteers will share more than 300 hours of companionship and friendship a month.
There are potentially hundreds of thousands of older people in Scotland who would benefit from Contact the Elderly’s tea parties. Reaching these people is a top priority for the charity, as well as attracting volunteers to offer a small amount of time to help eradicate social isolation.
Morna O’May, head of service for Contact the Elderly in Scotland, is hopeful for the campaign.
She said: “The sad reality is there are older people sitting in homes in almost every street who have nowhere to go and no-one to see.
“This pricks at the social conscience but with busy lives, people may believe there is nothing they can do to help. There is – our tea parties mean sharing just a couple of hours once a month, or even once a year, in the company of a lovely group of people enjoying tea, cake and conversation.”
The charity, which has been operating in Scotland since 1971, is looking for both elderly people who could benefit from the scheme as well as volunteers.