Newcastle Building Society awards four-figure grant to food redistribution project

Newcastle Building Society has awarded a North Tyneside food redistribution project with a four-figure grant.

St Paul’s Community Partnership in Willington Quay runs a weekly FairShare scheme, where food donated by local retailers and collected from a range of other local sources is made available for people in need across the community to collect free of charge from its George Street centre.

The £1k grant has allowed St Paul’s to buy a series of sturdy metal storage units which have allowed the room to be properly organised and made it easier for food products to be made available in date order, so that nothing goes out of date without being used.

The funding is being provided through the Newcastle Building Society Community Fund at the Community Foundation, which offers grants to charities and community groups located in or around the communities served by the Society’s branch network.

Founded in 2009, St Paul’s Community Partnership was set up to build on the work done by the clergy and parishioners at St Paul’s Church and is responsible for a diverse range of different community improvement projects.

Rev Sue McCormack of St Paul’s Community Partnership, said: “The St Paul’s Centre is the only community building in Willington Quay and we try to make as much use of it as we can to the benefit of local residents.

“The rising demand we’re experiencing has been matched by the generosity of our supporters, but we’ve consequently seen our store room getting fuller and fuller, which has made it harder to manage what we have on offer and to arrange things as efficiently as we’d like.

“The storage units have made a terrific difference to the way in which we can manage our FairShare stores and there’s no way we could have afforded to buy them on our own, so we’re hugely grateful for the support that Newcastle Building Society has given us.”

Helen Palmer from Newcastle Building Society’s Bedford Street branch in North Shields, commented: “The breadth of the work that the Community Partnership undertakes across our area is hugely impressive and the positive impact it has on the lives of local people is immeasurable.

“Tackling food insecurity in our communities has been one of the key themes of our charitable work over the last two years and we’re very pleased to be able to support St Paul’s work in this area.”

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