Kindness will prevail after lockdown
Dear editor, This crisis has led to us all knowing our neighbours a little bit more.
We have reached out and tried to care for each other. The response across our communities has been fantastic with many daily acts of kindness and support being done, often quietly and without fuss. We have come together.
For some people this has been merely an extension of friendships that we had before, knowing our neighbours well for many years.
For others this has been a real opportunity to get to know people better.
It is an easy thing to say that we should all know our neighbours, but the reality of our lifestyles can make this hard to do.
We can spend years without interacting with those that live nearby.
We are all too busy, too involved in our daily routines that provide for only the briefest of conversations.
But this crisis has changed that and I know many people who have built friendships and started to help each other more.
No coordination or central planning could have brought this about, only a shared experience.
Suddenly we have something in common – “How are you doing with the lockdown?”
I have been impressed by how Stirling Council has stepped up to the plate.
Hard working and dedicated people have been involved in setting up an emergency response which has been remarkably effective.
The council is rightly focused on the most vulnerable and the most essential services.
It cannot provide everything for everyone.
This crucial planning and work often takes place unseen by most. Just as vital is the support that has sprung up, unbidden, from across our neighbourhoods
What people are doing for each other, without the involvement of the council or other organisations, is huge.
It shows what can be done, what strength we have in each other and in our communities.
Whether it is stopping to spend the time of day with a neighbour, taking a second list to the shops for someone who is self-isolating or being available to take a call from someone who is lonely, we are all making a contribution. Not only to the defeat of this virus, but to building our community to be stronger and deeper in the future.
All this is being done without the apparatus of government. They are busy protecting the most vulnerable, supporting heroic social care workers, nurses and doctors and maintaining basic services such as making sure our bins keep being emptied or key worker children can safely be looked after.
These are the strengths of government and I am proud of how well Stirling council staff have met these challenges. But community, friends, neighbours and families helping each other, as they are, can lead to something far better after we get through this crisis.
We do not need to be directed to help each other, we just do it. I really hope we do not let that fall away when the immediate demand is no longer there.
I also hope that government, at every level, recognises that less is definitely more in this case.
It is not a failure to rely on people to rely on each other. Government Support where needed but with a light touch.
Trust people to get on with it and they will.
Councillor Neil Benny, Stirling West ward