Our director Cheryl says, “Carers in our community have been adversely hit by COVID-19. Especially unpaid carers, those who are often forgotten about and not accessing the support they need. We have been delivering programmes with partners like this over our 40-year history and are thrilled by this boost to help us extend our reach and build on a service that we know is important for the North Tyneside area.”
We are working with local community voluntary partners to create an alliance of organisations to support carers across the borough, especially in Wallsend and North Shields.
We are also excited to be working with Professor Stephen Clift, who is our Critical Friend for Better Connect. Stephen is Emeritus Professor for the Sidney De Haan Research Centre for Arts and Health at Canterbury Christ Church University. He is one of the founding editors of Arts & Health: An international journal for research, policy and practice and co-editor of the Oxford Textbook for Creative Arts, Health and Wellbeing. He has worked very closely with the Royal Society for Public Health in promoting the field of arts and health, and established the Arts and Health Awards in 2008, and the Arts, Health and Wellbeing Special Interest Group, in 2015.
The Thriving Communities Fund supported local voluntary, community, faith and social enterprise projects that brought together place-based partnerships to improve and increase the range and reach of available social prescribing community activities – especially for those people most impacted by COVID19 and health inequalities.
