STAFF from a brand new Covid-19 Community Support Hub have spoken out about how they have helped thousands of people deal with problems from grief to food shortage.

Fran Anderson, Assistant Director for Communities and Health, said: “It was on the second day we had one of our most harrowing calls, it was a grieving family member of a person who had just died of Covid-19 and was really heart-breaking. A baptism of fire. The whole team was involved in making sure this person had the support and advice she needed.

"We did all we could to help this family in a very difficult situation. It really brought home the importance of what we were doing here.”

Fran and Sue Fenwick, Principal Democratic Services and Scrutiny Officer, established a brand new Covid-19 Community Support Hub, a call centre which has so far made and received well over 3,500 calls to residents and helped in the delivery of nearly 4,00 food parcels.

It was a brand-new team at Redcar’s Community Heart building designed to work as one with the food and supplies distribution hub right at the moment the country went into an unprecedented full lockdown.

Neither had done anything like this before, but, they had a wealth of expert council workers ready and willing to help.

Colleagues volunteered from all parts of the council, from Children and Families, Adults and Communities, Employment and Benefits, Libraries, Communications, Customer Services and Business Support.

The Community Support Hub has provided crucial support for the people of Redcar and Cleveland.

A total of 1,980 calls have been received so far and a further 1,650 made to residents and 3,817 food parcels have been delivered along with other vital supplies.

The calls are not always quick, with one person with a complicated problem on the phone for one hour and 13 minutes - the record so far.

Sue said: “We had to learn some important lessons quickly. One was making sure you get the right person to talk to the right caller. Another was actually taking the time needed with each person to do as thorough a job as possible. The worst was someone shouting at a member of the team who had volunteered for the first time.”