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The Better Together project in Stoke-on-Trent has received £483,734 of National Lottery funding over four years from the Big Lottery Fund.
The project is operated by MHA’s Stoke North Live at Home scheme in partnership with Father Hudson’s Young at Heart initiative. The new partnership will expand and enhance existing services, developing additional services in new areas of Stoke, and Newcastle-under-Lyme.
The Better Together project will significantly increase the support available for vulnerable and isolated older people, enabling the employment of additional staff and recruitment of more volunteers to establish at least ten new activity groups in and around Stoke.
In addition, the grant will also help fund trips out, dancing and exercise clubs, craft sessions and talks from other organisations involved in adult social care, as well as introducing technology classes focusing on the use of tablets, mobile phones and Skype.
The partnership between MHA and Father Hudson’s Young at Heart project will help alleviate loneliness and isolation within local communities through an outreach and support service, which will deliver home visits and face-to-face or telephone befriending activities.
Liz Daley, MHA’s Stoke Live at Home Manager said, “The number of isolated older people living alone is growing. The National Lottery funding will ensure that we can carry on delivering these vital services, which so many older people in the local community depend on. For a lot of our members our scheme is the only activity they come to all week; we might be the only people they speak with all week.
"Having just celebrated our 25th anniversary, this grant is validation for the great work we have been undertaking in the community over the last couple of decades.”
Matt Ford, Community Project Co-ordinator for Young at Heart said, “The grant offer is brilliant news. The funding will transform the lives of the older people we already support and the lives of many more across Staffordshire that we can now reach. The groups, activities, trips out and home visits all mean so much to them.
"I’m very pleased that Father Hudson’s Care is working with MHA and I look forward to developing this partnership with them.”