A NEWLY established lunch club will continue for another year thanks to a community grant.

Laurel Avenue Community Association, in Durham, set up a weekly lunch club last year for older people living on the Sherburn Road estate and the surrounding area.

Up to 25 people have been attending the lunches, which are run with support from Gilesgate Residents Association, the King’s Church in Durham and volunteers from Durham University.

It has been given a £1,000 grant from Newcastle Building Society’s community fund to cover the cost of room hire and part of its food budget.

Claire Linfoot, the association’s centre manager, said: “Tackling social isolation through initiatives like our lunch club can make a massive difference to the health and well-being of older people who might not otherwise get the chance to speak to anyone for days at a time, and the nutrition side of the project adds an important extra dimension to what we do.

“We initially had enough money to run the project for a year, and the generous support we’ve had from the society has taken away all the worries we had about meeting the basic costs of putting on the lunch club for a further 12 months.”