Wigan community rallies together to help vulnerable in coronavirus crisis

A community group forced to cancel its inaugural meeting due to the coronavirus outbreak has found a new way to help people in the area.

Hindley and Hindley Green Community Action Group was being set up to work with local groups, the council and other organisations to make a difference.

But rather than postponing efforts due to the pandemic, members decided to help residents in another way.

The group’s chairman Christine Lawler said: “We wanted to do something around supporting our community in the current climate and, knowing there was a food bank giving out parcels, we were aware people were asking for someone just to do their shopping instead. We decided to set up a service that does that.”

Hindley and Hindley Green Community Helpers got to work three weeks ago, with a team of 14 people first delivering leaflets with details about the service and then getting to work.

Christine said: “People give us a ring, we take a shopping list from them and details about them. One of our volunteers goes to do the shopping for them, we pay for it and then it’s delivered in single-use carrier bags in a non-contact approach where we put them on the doorstep and people come to collect it.”

The scheme is for people who are shielding or isolating, though has now expanded to NHS and other frontline workers whose shift patterns make it difficult to go to the shops.

There are 75 registered households so far, made up of around 100 people, and volunteers did 50 shopping trips last week.

The scheme is proving to be popular and means that people can have their favourite products, from the supermarket of their choice, despite not being able to leave home.

Christine said: “They are absolutely thrilled. They can get what they want. They don’t want charity a lot of them, they want to pay their own way and they want what they would normally have.

“We attempt to shop for what they normally have and go to where they want us go to - Tesco, Aldi, Asda, M&S.

“It’s making a huge difference to them because they are staying at home like they have been asked to do, but apart from being in four walls, life can carry on as normal as it can be because they are getting their shopping and eating what they would normally.

“One or two were almost in tears when they phoned us because they were at the point where they didn’t know what to do.”

As well as helping with shopping, the volunteers can look out for those receiving deliveries. They recently bought a microwave for a woman with vision problems cooking frozen meals on a hob, as her microwave was broken, and contacted social services to see if more help was available.

The group received a £650 grant from Forever Manchester, which pays for essential items such as carrier bags and gloves for volunteers, and both Aldi in Hindley Green and Tesco in Hindley provide priority access for the helpers so they do not need to queue to get inside.

To order shopping call Christine on 07811 741 719 or find out more on the Hindley and Hindley Green Community Action Group Facebook page.