By Tommy Bonnet
Elderly people from across Nottingham say they would struggle to face winter without the support of charities offering them ‘warm rooms’ and support to beat loneliness and isolation.
The recent cut to pensioner’s winter fuel payments, which support heating bills, has led Nottingham charities such as The Renewal Trust to increase their efforts.
The trust runs ‘Feel Good Gold’ to provide extra support to the elderly.
The scheme is offering weekly hot food, activities and support services for people across St Ann’s and Sneinton at the Cherry Lodge community centre on Carlton Road.
Valerie Young, 61, was at Wednesday’s Feel Good Gold session.
She said: “I was a dinner lady at a school and after an accident I ended up reducing my hours, and when I finished work I would just sleep, sleep, sleep.
“I would wake up disorientated because you don’t know the day of the week or how long you’ve been sleeping, my daughter told me that wasn’t a good thing so she signed me up.”
Valerie has since been coming for around a year, getting picked up in a minibus and taken to the centre every week.
She said: “Well now I base my week and when I’m available around this, I look forward to coming over here because that’s my only time to get out and socialise.”
On the issue of heating for the elderly, Valerie said: “Vulnerable people are struggling who don’t ask for help.
“When you see people sitting around in the Victoria Centre, they’re there keeping themselves warm because they can’t get warm at home, and when you do go home you wrap up in a sheet with a nice cup of tea.”
Just over 200,000 pensioners in Nottinghamshire county received between £100 and £300 towards their heating bills in 2023 to get them through the colder months.
However, 147,000 who aren’t on means-tested benefits will miss out this year in the county alone, according to council figures, following the new Labour Government’s decision to reduce the allowance nationwide.
Community leader for the Renewal Trust and Feel Good Gold, Nic Williams spoke on the importance of teaching elderly people new skills and support, especially with the cut in funding to their fuel costs.
He said: “Definitely one of the things now is giving those skills of how to save money, how to use money more wisely and particularly those simple things to saving energy costs in the house.
“I think there’s lots of information out there. We rely heavily on social media and things like that.
“Some of our older people don’t have access to social media or just aren’t of the generation to be able to use it. So it is really important that we still give that advice, but also sometimes giving it in a way that they can understand it and access it.”
While dementia support and energy saving help are in the rota of activities, it is also just about providing elderly with a warm space and a place to socialise.
Charities such as Feel Good Gold not only operate on a referral join up system, but also reach out to the elderly people in the community around them.
These include 83-year-old Sandra Stones, who says the charity came around to her flats offering support. She has since been a member for over a year.
She said: “It’s very important to get out and meet people. There’s a common room where I live but it is tricky, this is one of the main social activities I have.”
The Labour Government says it had been forced to make the drastic cut in order to bridge a £22bn blackhole left by the previous Conservative administration.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer also said the decision was part of a plan to “fix the foundations” of the wider economy.
