Latest update
Published
Header image for article 6836

A service set up to help the area's most vulnerable people has handled more than 21,000 calls during the coronavirus pandemic. 

Falkirk Council’s Support for People service, set up in March 2020 as a rapid response to the COVID-19 emergency, aimed to make sure people had access to food, medicine and essentials under lockdown.

The service became a conduit between citizens in need and the huge number of volunteers and community groups who went to exceptional lengths to serve their communities.

In the year-plus since the service was established, more than 10,000 people have been supported through self-isolation grants, food parcels, medical supplies, and financial advice.

To date, the service has helped to support:

  • 2,225 households provided with food parcels
  • 962 households with medical supply deliveries
  • 608 households supported with fuel costs
  • More than 400 school pupils for food costs during self-isolation
  • More than 700 self-isolation support grants
  • 1,332 pupils receiving the Winter Hardship Payment
  • Financial and other advice to 866 callers

Supporting people

For the Support for People service, there was an emphasis on supporting those most in need – such as people on the shielding list – but the service strived to help anyone who asked for it. 

Fairer Falkirk Manager Sally Buchanan explained:

“Some of the greatest impact we made was just answering the phone. We could be the only human contact some people had for weeks at a time, especially if they were shielding.”

Falkirk Council staff played the role of broker, connecting people to voluntary organisations in the area who were best placed to help – such as food banks and the Royal Voluntary Service, who clocked up 180,000 volunteer hours between March 2020 and March 2021.

Through effective needs-based assessment, the service coordinated responses with voluntary organisations in the area based on the individual’s own circumstances. The result was a fair, transparent service with the user at the heart of decision-making.

Sally said:

“We had a database of community groups based on their location and how they could help citizens. That meant we could quickly direct funding and people to the right volunteers.
“By taking an individual needs-based approach, we managed to address each person’s situation most effectively while allocating funding where it would create most value.”

Volunteers

Falkirk’s volunteers and community organisations were lifelines to many in the response to a devastating global coronavirus outbreak, with Falkirk Council helping to connect people in need with the many people who wanted to help.

Research from the universities of Sheffield, Hull and Leeds found that volunteers formed a crucial part of the United Kingdom’s national response to the coronavirus outbreak, and this was clear to see in Falkirk’s communities.

And while Council staff played their part, with a renewed sense of purpose in the midst of uncertainty, Sally is keen to highlight the service of volunteers – the ‘boots on the ground’.

“It was, and is, a genuine partnership between Falkirk Council and our partners.

“We played our part, but our utmost gratitude must go to the volunteers who were out there day in, day out, and are still helping Falkirk’s communities even now.”

Support for People has now been embedded into the Council’s Advice Hubs team to help people in financial difficulty through income and debt advice.