Because The Upper Room provides hot meals each weekday evening to anyone who needs them, there is indeed a particular and diverse group of around 100+ who attend each night. So if you do have food to donate, please contact the Cobbold Road site (020 8740 5688) during office hours (meal time is from 5.30 so a bit too hectic to receive food then).The Meals programme that provides these meals makes use of food from FareShare (itself a food re-distribution enterprise), from donations from the local community (especially the Harvest Appeal which makes good links with local schools and churches) and also from its own FoodBank. As you can imagine, the chef performs culinary miracles on a daily basis, with the food that is available.The FoodBank part of the charity picks up food from its partners and redistributes this to a number of places, including its Meals programme and to other foodbanks, predominantly in west London. The FoodBank programme runs alongside the UR4Driving project, whose primary objective is to work with ex-offenders in getting them job ready/able, not just for entry-level work, but specifically by putting them through driving lessons and, hopefully, passing their test so they can apply for jobs in a number of different sectors. BEFORE they can join that programme they volunteer - to help with the FoodBank distribution programme! As the volunteering is all about time-keeping and working alongside other people (ie instilling a work discipline) whilst at the same time helping to re-distribute the food to those who need it, this programme has an incredibly positive outcome for all those involved/benefiting from it. more info on the website, especially on the latest award! theupperroom.org.uk
Veronica Tuke ● 4821d