An appeal to help give homeless people accommodation during the winter has been launched by the Wanstead Parish.
The churches are hoping to raise £3,500 to help give homeless people somewhere to stay – in part because the parish is unable to offer winter night shelter accommodation, as it did last year, because of coronavirus restrictions.
The appeal would give the homeless people somewhere safe and warm to stay, a meal, professional support from a caseworker and medical experts, and befriending from volunteers. The cost for each person is £25 per night – but £5 of this will be funded by the local authority.
Full details of the appeal are here on the Aviva Community fundraising site.
Very sad that Wanstead Christchurch cannot run its overnight shelter this year. Is there really no way it could at least offer accomodation to say 6 people? Hot meals could be delivered by local people.
Toni, the parish cannot operate its night shelter because it goes against Covid regulations on shared airspace. Instead, they are raising funds to get homeless people into hotel accommodation – each person will have their own room with en suite bathroom. Rough sleepers are one of the most vulnerable groups so we have a duty of care to keep them safe.
This goes for night shelters around the country, not just Wanstead.
Local volunteers will be cooking meals for them – as they did last year. These will be delivered to the hotel. Plus providing a befriending service.