During four months of the Covid-19 crisis, the Cambuslang Food Hub supported 750 local families with food and other essentials. Run by Cambuslang Community Council, a team of volunteers worked five days a week to provide food bags to help families keep going.
The Cambuslang Food Hub was set up by Cambuslang Community Council in mid-April as part of the CamGlen Covid Response coordinated by the Healthy n Happy Community Development Trust. The Cambuslang Food Hub was based in St Bride’s RC Church Parish Hall and staffed by members of the Community Council and other volunteers.
Clare Williamson, Cambuslang Community Council member, said:
“We had a fantastic team of 26 volunteers working morning and afternoon shifts to manage the food supplies, take orders and pack bags at the Hub. We also had a big team of drivers making home deliveries and doing the supermarket collections. We were overwhelmed by the support we received from volunteers who put in hundreds of hours of work, especially by young people who gave up part of their summer to help.”
“This was a real community effort with residents and businesses working together. We are extremely grateful to more than 200 donations received from local people. Many were given on a regular basis and several of them were provided by groups of families and neighbourhoods. The Rotary Club very generously donated £4000 to both the Cambuslang and Rutherglen Food Hubs.”
We had regular donations from Co-op, Morrisons and Tesco as well as support from Asda and Lidl. South Lanarkshire Council helped us get up and running with ‘starter bags’ and provided us with weekly supplies of goods we were short of as well as the sanitary packs when requested. Our smaller businesses pitched in too: The Kracken chippy, for example, gave us sacks of potatoes. “
John Bachtler, Chair of Cambuslang Community Council said:
“As a Community Council, we were very pleased to play a part in the wider CamGlen Covid Response. Our members, Clare Williamson and Mark Lauterburg, did a fantastic job on organising the set-up and running of the Hub, managing the team and ensuring that everything worked smoothly. We are particularly grateful to St Bride’s RC Church for letting us share their Parish Hall working alongside their own parish food support operation. Fr Paul Morton and Maureen Clayton couldn’t have been more welcoming and helpful.”
“The Covid pandemic has been a really tough time for many members of our community who lost jobs and income. Many have struggled to feed themselves and their families, especially where they did not qualify for the government support. We are incredibly fortunate to have Healthy n Happy working in our community. They did a superb job in coordinating the CamGlen Covid Response in both Cambuslang and Rutherglen with cross-party support from our elected members and a lot of help from South Lanarkshire Council.”
The Cambuslang Food Hub has now closed, with food deliveries being coordinated from the Rutherglen Food Hub before the Cambuslang and Rutherglen Food Bank takes over from the start of September.