Voluntary sector that stepped up during the pandemic now struggling due to lack of funding
“We have literally fed all sections of the community,” Fr Tom Davis, the chair of the trustees of Oldham Foodbank, says of the charity’s work in the town in Greater Manchester during the pandemic. “People struggling with kids being at home during lockdown and needing more meals, people on furlough who got into huge debt, homeless people who were put into hostels, and a couple who were living in a car.”
Oldham, which has five neighbourhoods that are among the 1% most deprived in England, is one of the places worst hit by Covid-19. Last summer, the town had the highest coronavirus infection rate in the country, and, after another sharp rise this summer, it has the fifth highest total number of confirmed cases.
