BE kind always is the motto emblazoned on Refuweegee director Selina Hales’s T-shirt. They are warm words, but it’s a chilly day and she is shivering outside the organisation’s storage space in an industrial part of Glasgow.
She carefully places bags of food, toiletries and entertainment for families – games, books, and toys – a few metres away from members of the volunteer delivery team, who are ready to whisk off the supplies to eagerly waiting individuals and families across the city.
This is an enthusiastic mix of volunteers, some on foot, others stuffing packs into bike panniers to cycle them across town, though the majority are driving cars or vans.
Hales set up Refuweegee in 2015 with a focus on helping refugees and asylum seekers. But for the duration of this crisis the charity has pledged to help anyone in need, regardless of their background.
So far their packs have reached more than 1200 people, with big families of five, six and upwards amongst the recipients. On Thursday they delivered to a family of 12.
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Meanwhile this down-at-heel storage space has become the charity’s hub, and for over a week Hales – along with staff members Hannah Gibbons and Clare Bury – have been assembling an average of 100 packs each day.
Inside, the space is packed with nappies, toothpaste and brushes, pastas and rice, tins and jars, toys galore, packs of cards (bought new as a multi-pack with cash donations that the team say are particularly welcome), books, and a host of other useful items to get people who have next to nothing through lockdown.
The work here has become a new daily ritual, born out of the need to help those they knew would struggle most with the crisis as the lockdown began to take hold.
Hales explains: “We were just horrified by the thought of the people that we work with – who are often so isolated – becoming even more isolated. They are already working on a pretty impossible budget [asylum seekers get about £5 per day to live on] and at the same time they won’t get school meals or childcare, and what happens if they get ill? That concern overtook our own fear and we knew we had to act.”
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The charity also had a huge backlog of toys and games that it had not already distributed – items that had been donated long in advance of any possible contamination – so that formed the starting point of the Covid-19 packs.
REFUWEEGEE knew that it also needed to source food, and so has teamed up with the Glasgow south-east food bank, which was itself struggling to deliver as most of its volunteers were over 60 and less able to help given the greater risks.
“We came in and we are now able to offer food, toiletry and entertainment packs to everyone who needs them,” says Hales. “An important point was that it should be available to everyone, no exceptions.”
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Those who need support are asked to send a text with their request and delivery details will be collected by the co-ordinator. Volunteers ring the buzzers when they arrive, leave the package on the doorstep, and step back to make sure it’s been received.
The feedback, Hales says, has been heart-warming. “Our volunteer co-ordinator Jen gets the texts, and she says she must be the most blessed person in Glasgow because she gets the most brilliant messages,” she says.
“Paddy, one of our volunteers, delivered some play dough yesterday and he could hear the squeals of delight from the kids as he was leaving. Sometimes our volunteers will arrive and the kids are all waiting at the window. We gave a digger set to a couple of twin boys and they couldn’t have been more delighted – they were just over the moon.”
The experience has also made her reflect on the nature of inequality that this crisis exposes. “It’s impossible not to notice in terms of the address labels that we are putting on that poverty is connected to postcode,” she says. “That’s something that we need to address longer-term. And there’s also something about the flexibility people have now.
“We’ve been forced into this lockdown situation and so many people have had more of an opportunity to give something back. We really hope that people – and their employers – are able to find ways for this to continue afterwards.”
To find out more or get involved, go to: www.refuweegee.co.uk/isolation-support-flyers
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