Charity Launches Online Support Service

Stoke-on-Trent based mental health charity Changes has launched a new online service to offer sport during the Coronavirus pandemic.

The changeshere4u website provides access to all the services the charity previously delivered in the community.

These include peer support groups and wellbeing training, one to one phone and video support is also available.

In an online statement Changes say existing members and anyone looking for a little extra help in these unprecedented times can 'easily access' their services using their computer, tablet or mobile phone'.

This, Changes say, will 'enable us to continue to support your wellbeing and recovery'.

Many of the courses usually delivered at the Changes Wellbeing Centre based at Victoria Court in Stoke have moved online. These include the popular Recovery, Wellbeing and Making Changes workshops.

Online peer support groups meetings take place on weekdays at 11am, 1pm and 6pm and at 1pm on Saturdays on the Zoom video conferencing platform. There is also a women only meeting held every Tuesday.

The Changes Young People service is also now operating online.

Further details about all the online services can be found by visiting:

www.changeshere4u.org.uk or by calling 07983437747

The charity would like to reassure long standing members and people new to the service that 'whatever the needs of you and your family during this difficult time, Changes is here for you'.

If you found this article helpful, please consider making a small donation to support the NHS during this national crisis.

Corruption Under the Sun

Does murder in the Carribean make you think of Miss Marple Ricky g a nasty case of sun stroke on an island with white sandy beaches? If so the first book reviewed here might change your mind.

In Black Rain Falling ((Sphere) Jacob Ross has his protagonist Michael 'Digger'Digson investigate a case involving murder and drug smuggling on the island of Camaho, a thinly disguised Grenada. Along the way he encounters rivalries within the police, political corruption and the legacy of his own family history.

Ross also turns a pretty clear eye to wider areas of island life that the tourist brochures tend to ignore. Including endemic cronyism, poverty, the long shadow of colonialism and the cultural and personal impact of toxic masculinity. All of which is a long way way from simplistic narratives about happy islanders playing steel drums and relaxing on the beach.

Ross does so in prose that shows him to have an unerring eye for sporting the tangled mix of beauty and badness and a musicians eat for the distinctive speech of the region.

Literary crime fiction all too often hides the mediocre behind a tho veneer of pretension. Jacob Ross though is the real deal, he has delivered a novel that manages to do all the things a good piece of crime writing should, as well as having worthwhile things to say about the society it is set in. That should be more than enough to earn it and him a place in the canon of great Carribean writing.

When Angels Sleep (Piatkus), by Mark Griffin also turns over a few of the crime genres more tired tropes. The book opens with the body of a child being found neatly arranged in Epping Forest, suggesting that the capital's latest serial killer is setting out his stall. This is the second outing for forensic psychologist Holly Wakefield, a woman with almost as many dark areas in her psyche as the killers she helps the police track down.

Two things save this book from being another familiar trip down the weedy trail blazed by legions of troubled investigators. First of all Wakefield is made human and therefore likeable by her flaws. Second Griffin writes about people who kill and kill again in a determinedly realistic way.

There are no crazed geniuses of slavering monsters to be found here, his killers are, mostly, men defined by all the things they aren't. Like capable of forming a settled identity or having empathy with their fellow creatures. That makes what could have been a safety formulaic book into an often rather chilling one.

From a setting Dame Christie used to the sort of book she might have written had she been working now. The Lazarus Charter (The Conrad Press) by Tony Bassett displays, in the best possible way, many of the characteristics of a classic British B movie.

These are evident from the moment Bob Shaw encounters an old friend who is supposed to have died weeks earlier on the London Underground. An incident that involves Bob and his wife Annie in a plot concerning a secret weapons system, Russian agents trying to steal it and lengths our own intelligence services will go to to stop them. A situation they respond to with a mixture of resourcefulness and good humour that is, ahem, rather uniquely British.

The result is, this reviewer would be the first to admit, more that a little improbable; and splendid fun nevertheless. At times like these books that provide a diversion and do the important job of cheering us all up are performing a vital national service.

If you enjoyed this review please consider giving a small donation to support the NHS during this national crisis.

Charities at risk of falling victim to the pandemic

VAST, a group supporting charities in Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire has warned many of the organisations it works with may be facing a struggle to survive. As a result services depended on by vulnerable people may disappear.

Nationally even large charities are facing an uncertain future, third sector news site Civil Society reported that the sector is set to lose £4.3 billion in fundraising income over the next three months.

Charities at risk include the St John's Ambulance, who have been key players in supporting the NHS as it responds to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Chief executive Martin Houghton-Brown told Civil Society that his "entire organisation is now delivering for Covid-19", by that without significant help from the government "we will run out of money".

He added this would result in trustees having to make "very difficult judgements" about the organisations future.

Other charities facing difficulty include Barnado's, who have seen their funding fall by 30%.

locally VAST has seen its income fall dramatically after lockdown restrictions forced the closure of its sites at the Dudson Centre in Janet and The Hub in Stafford.

Acting chief executive Lisa Healings said in a press statement "so many people in Stoke-on-Trent are thankful for the support they receive from local groups. The organisations we work with provide practical help, advice and in many cases, the only social contact people have".

Local charities were, she said, keen to help people during these difficult times, but few crisis in funding was forcing many to take tough decisions about their future.

On Wednesday chancellor Rishi Sunak announced a package of measures to support charities worth £750million, £370million of which will go towards supporting smaller charities.

Responses from third sector organisations have been mixed, Karl Wilding of the National Council of Voluntary Organisations welcomed the package as "an important first step", but said more support would be needed in the long term.

Other charity leaders expressed scepticism, Lynda Thomas of Macmillan Cancer Support told the BBC the funding wouldn't be enough to "prevent many of the nation's charities cutting the support they provide when it is needed most".

Barnado's chief executive, a so speaking to the BBC Javed Khan said the package was "little more than a sticking plaster".

The government's plans received qualified support from newly appointed shadow chancellor Anneliese Dodds, told BBC news that while welcome the additional funding fell "short of filling the financial black hole many organisations are facing".

These are unprecedented times in which both the government and charities have had to respond to unimaginable challenges at speed. This that come afterwards and last much longer are likely to be even harder.

Charities will play a vital role in rebuilding something like normality once the pandemic is over. Without adequate support from government they will not be able to do so and many people will suffer needlessly as a result.

If you have found this article useful, please consider making a small donation to support the NHS during this national crisis.

A Poem for Our Troubled Times

Applause


That night, under cold
stars
A million hands clapped,

The rhythm of distanced
lives
Coming suddenly together,

A shrunken world
growing
Larger in that moment,

An ovation of hope
flowing
Over a lonely globe,

And, as in a child's
dream
Raising a crop of rainbows.

April 2020