TWRFC has a long standing partnership with Nourish Community Foodbank but with the “Lockdown” hitting our community hard members have stepped up to volunteer to support the team at Nourish.

“We were busy before the lockdown supporting over 7,000 people in crisis per year across the borough of Tunbridge Wells and Tonbridge” said Operations Manager Dawn Stanford. “Since lockdown we have seen over a 100% increase in referrals and we have also been asked to be part of TWBC’s Frontline response team to COVID-19. At the same time as demand has increased, we have lost a lot of our usual food and monetary donation locations e.g. churches, schools and businesses plus we have had to work around many of our existing volunteers self-isolating due to age.”

Families from TWRFC have come forward to help weigh-in and sort donations, stack shelves, pack and deliver food parcels. Nourish are restricted to the number of volunteers that can be in the packing unit due to social distancing requirements. Volunteers have worked in household groups so they aren’t limited by social distancing and Nourish supplied gloves, aprons and sanitiser on site. Deliveries are managed by knocking on clients doors without the need for contact.

Here are just a couple of examples of TWRFC families supporting Nourish

The Weaver family have been out delivering food parcels:

“I’ve always had massive respect for Nourish Community Foodbank and the support it gives our community so when Dawn asked the parents of the U12s for drivers to help with deliveries, I was really pleased to be able to help out a couple of times a week” said Tam Weaver. “It is fantastic that Nourish were able to turn to the club for help to continue with their essential work during lockdown”

The Dexter family have also been out and about supporting deliveries:

Ele Dexter commented “We want to support our community in any way we can and volunteering for Nourish Community Foodbank seemed like a great way to do something good on a regular basis.”

The Raine family have been supporting weighing-in, sorting stock and deliveries:

“I was amazed how busy the team are, it’s easy to forget that even in an affluent area people are struggling and need support from organisations like Nourish” said Drew Raine “With lock down presenting even more challenges we wanted to help as much as we could and it’s great to see the wider TWRFC family supporting a community in need.”

For more information about the work of Nourish Community Foodbank and how you can donate or help, please go to:

www.nourishcommunityfoodbank.org.uk

or follow them on facebook @nourishcommunityfoodbank