Western Daily Press (Saturday)
‘A lot more people are coming for help now’
THE RISING COST OF LIVING MEANS MORE HOUSEHOLDS ARE STRUGGLING – SO SUPERMARKET CHAIN LIDL IS STEPPING IN TO SUPPORT CHARITIES HELPING PEOPLE IN THEIR COMMUNITIES PUT MEALS ON THE TABLE
“PEOPLE ARE FALLING through the cracks,” says Mike Morell of LifeHouse in Portsmouth, a charity that provides food and additional services to people facing homelessness and other challenges. “We know of people who are living in huts, industrial sheds and derelict boats that are beached by the river.”
The LifeHouse centre – which is supported by a grant from Lidl – gives out around 500 food parcels a month, and around 25 of these a week are delivered to vulnerable people who cannot make it into the building. The volunteers make a full cooked breakfast on Wednesdays, and on Thursdays they provide an evening meal. The centre is open three days a week and also offers rooms for meetings, free Wi-Fi to help with job applications or benefits, a range of donated clothes and household items, and visits from hairdressers and footcare specialists.
HOMELESS
Mike has worked with LifeHouse since 2017 and, while the centre was set up - cure housing, the need is greater now. “We have a lot more people coming to the door for food parcels,” he says. “People are starting to queue outside in the morning. When benefits are paid monthly, they start to run out of money around week three or four.
“We get elderly people coming to us who live in atrocious conditions. Nothing but newspaper on the floor, no money for electricity, toilets that don’t work… We do what we can, but you always wish you could do more.”
The cost of living is rising sharply: the current rate of inflation is 10.1 per cent – the highest in 40 years – and could hit 13 per cent, according to the
Bank of England.
Over one quarter of people in the UK have skipped meals to save money. And for people on lower incomes that figure is even higher, with one in three saying they have missed out on food because of the cost of living crisis*.
PRESSURE
Further increases are predicted, as Brexit (according to the Office of National Statistics) and the war in Ukraine put pressure on supplies. And rising costs for gas and electricity are adding to the strain for many UK households. Many organisations in Portsmouth have found there’s power in working together. “There’s a
WhatsApp group with about 80 of us: charities, the council and other organisations,” says Mike. The group shares knowledge, and also items, making sure food donations are always used up and donations of things like duvets aren’t rejected for lack of space.
Businesses also help out. Mike points to many in his area who have made generous donations. “Lidl has been great,” he says. “It has the donation boxes at the front of the supermarket, but it’s also very good at giving us things from the back, like multipacks that have been split up, or produce that
has been mislabelled.”
FUND
Lidl is working with Neighbourly, a platform that connects local businesses to charities in their area. A fund of £500,000 has been set up by Lidl, accessible to the network of charities that currently collect food from Lidl GB stores to give to those in need.
LifeHouse has used the grant it was awarded from Lidl to get a new door for the centre. “The old one had been there since Victorian times,” says Mike. “It had been boarded over, though, so it was just a sheet of wood really.” The new door is much more secure and it is also wider, which improves accessibility for users in wheelchairs or with prams.
The grant awarded by Lidl means LifeHouse and other charities can continue to give support to the people who need it. And Lidl shoppers can know they are spending their money with a retailer who cares about their community.