Leamington-based charity that helps homeless and vulnerable people needs more volunteers

A Leamington-based charity that helps homeless and vulnerable people is appealing for more volunteers and donations.

Helping Hands is appealing to the community for extra help.

The charity works with vulnerable and homeless people in the district by providing much-needed help through a soup kitchen, their cafe in Warwick, skills training and their ‘House2Home’ service, which provides household items that the tenants could not afford to buy themselves.

Today the team at the charity has issued a letter addressing their needs and what they have had to do because of the coronavirus outbreak.

In the letter is says: "We want to update you on how we will continue to support the most vulnerable people in Leamington, Warwick and Kenilworth during these difficult times.

"We have made some tough decisions to make sure our people are protected whilst remaining committed to supporting the homeless and vulnerable.

"During these times, we need your help more than ever.

"We have made the difficult decision to temporarily close our Gateway Café in Warwick until further notice, in line with the Government’s new guidelines."

The team have also made changes to their day time drop-in/evening soup kitchens.

This includes:

~Moving Gateway Café staff to the soup kitchen to help prepare daytime and evening meals, which will now be takeaway.

~ When collecting takeaway food, people must wash their hands and use sanitiser.

~ People will not be able to stay to eat their food

~ The team are also looking to set up a food delivery service for those who cannot come along during drop in times

The Lighthouse shop in Gloucester Street in Leamington will open for now but the team are reviewing this daily.

Donations can still be made but all items must be bagged and tied at the top or in boxes. Visitors must also use hand sanitiser as they enter the shop.

The team have had to make changes to their House2Home services. They said: " Due to the nature of volunteers visiting and entering people’s homes, we are suspending our House2Home Project from today for any non-urgent cases of furniture deliveries. Any urgent cases will still be considered, and risk assessed on a case by case basis."

How you can help

The Helping Hands team anticipate running out of key items such as:

~ takeaway meal containers

~ hot drink cups

~ disposable cutlery

~ napkins

~ latex gloves

~ toilet rolls

~ cleaning solutions

If you are able to donate items take them to the shop / drop in centre: The Lighthouse, 12 Gloucester Street in Leamington during the drop in hours.

Alternatively spokesperson added: "If you’re unable to drop off items we would hugely appreciate a financial donation to help us purchase supplies. You can donate money by visiting tinyurl.com/donatetoHHLeam"If you’d like to help volunteer: please fill in our COVID-19 response volunteer form and we will be in touch as individual needs arise."

To fill out the form go to: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeaxRDCwc9pFCZ5MbPh7CAuyn3VkRVSI9U6PTHrDKTxPy2vtQ/viewformThe drop in/soup kitchen times are:

~ Monday afternoon (1pm to 3pm), Monday evening (6.30pm to 8pm)

~ Tuesday morning (10am and noon), Tuesday afternoon (1pm and 3pm), Tuesday evening (6.30pm and 8pm)

~ Thursday afternoon (1pm and 3pm), Thursday evening 6.30pm and 8pm.