Knowsley charity celebrates after receiving vital National Lottery COVID-19 grant to support older people

A local community project that caters to the needs of older people is celebrating today after receiving £10,000 funding from The National Lottery Community Fund, to tackle feelings of isolation and loneliness during lockdown.

Located in Knowsley, Merseyside, the Knowsley Pensioners Advocacy & Information Service Ltd (KPAIS) offers a shopping, house cleaning and befriending service through their project, Supporters Helping Older People in Knowsley (S.H.O.P).

S.H.O.P will use the money from the largest funder of community activity in the UK to provide support for older people, and ensure the new telephone befriending service continues to help reduce feelings of isolation and loneliness whilst vulnerable people are still mostly confined to their homes.

Prior to the onset of COVID-19, the group typically supported local people with accompanying them on shopping trips, and a cleaning service where the older person and their personal supporter cleaned together. The group’s activities are intended to encourage older people to become more independent in their own homes, with each service user allocated a dedicated ‘supporter’.

Patricia McCarthy, CEO, Knowsley Pensioners Advocacy & Information Service Ltd, said: “S.H.O.P was developed because we had become aware of the need for older people to have their independence, choice and dignity retained and maintained where possible. Although we provide practical support with cleaning, we are not a cleaning company. The value in our service lies in responding to their own wishes and needs. In many cases our cleaning calls involve the person cleaning, with our supporter taking on the bigger work, such as bending down to clean showers and to change the bed.”

However, when the lockdown was first introduced the organisation had to come up with new ways in which they could help the local community they support. With many of the organisation’s clientele in the most vulnerable age bracket, services such as helping them clean, or make their bed was not possible.

Patricia McCarthy said: “One of the most immediate challenges was the need to cancel all our existing cleaning calls due to the need for social distancing and to support older people who were shielding. This was very challenging as it impacted people in a number of ways. We worked with each customer individually to ascertain what was best for them. We were able to offer a weekly welfare call – this was not just to say ‘how are you’ but to spend time having a conversation. Some people chose to have one call per week, some people wanted more than one.”

Gillian Halliwell, Head of Funding for the North West at The National Lottery Community Fund, said: “The National Lottery is playing a critical role in supporting people, organisations and communities during these challenging times. Projects such as S.H.O.P are making an amazing contribution to the community-level response. We’re incredibly grateful for their dedication and the hard work of thousands of community-based organisations across the UK – we’re humbled by their efforts and delighted that our funding is able to help.”

In total, charities and community groups across Merseyside have been awarded more than £270,500 of National Lottery funding since the beginning of June – providing crucial support to overcome challenges caused by the COVID-19 crisis.

The National Lottery Community Fund distributes money raised by National Lottery players for good causes. Last year we awarded over half a billion pounds (£588.2 million) of life-changing funding to communities across the UK, and supported over 14,000 projects to turn their great ideas into reality and make a difference in their communities.

Across all of the National Lottery distributors, £600 million has been made available to support communities throughout the UK during the coronavirus outbreak. Thanks to National Lottery players, £30 million is raised every week for the UK’s good causes, and £41 billion has been distributed to 565,000 good causes across the UK since 1994.

To find out more visit www.TNLCommunityFund.org.uk