How one small community centre became a lockdown lifeline for families in Milton Keynes parish

When The Little Bookshop drop-in centre and café in Great Linford’s shopping centre was closed a few years ago, residents Alan Senior and Ruth Panther assembled a team of locals and the building firm Evolution to work pro-bono to refurbished it into a modern drop-in centre.

A Community Fridge was added to receive and distribute donations of food approaching their best before date and The Little Bookshop soon became an essential source of food for many struggling local families.

When lockdown began, the centre had to close to visitors, but the need to feed local families grew even greater, so Ruth Panther, who is the Chair of The Little Bookshop and also Great Linford Parish Council’s Community Liaison Officer, decided she needed to take matters into her own hands.

Supported by two of The Little Bookshop’s volunteers, Ruth arranged for both hot and cold food to be available to needy families outside the centre six days a week.

Lee and Lesley, two Great Linford residents and centre volunteers have spent their lockdown cooking meals and distributing food to people in need.

"The Little Bookshop has now become a busy food distribution centre thanks to these two dedicated volunteers who didn't want to see their community suffer from isolation and hunger during the lockdown," said centre committee member Peter Fraser.

"Social distancing rules required a one-way system to be established and ropes to be set up two metres apart at waist height with a 2m table between them for food to be pushed across to visitors," he said.

"There was an initial worry that there wouldn't be enough food coming in, but when restaurants closed for the Lockdown, the team benefited from generous donations of food from many of the local closed restaurants such as Frankie & Bennies at Kingston, Nandos at the MK Hub, Costa in Great Linford, Subway at the Xscape, Chartwells in Newport Pagnell, MK Melting Pot, Faith Dimensions Church in Wolverton, Gosh, FoodBank and Fareshare."

Teaming up with MK Community Fridge, they have also been receiving excess food from Waitrose, LIDL in Wolverton and Bletchley and their regular source, the Great Linford Co-op next door.

Peter said: "It soon became clear that many residents were in need of this facility with Lesley cooking around 70 meals a day which are either collected or delivered and are all created in a couple of crockpots. Tons of food have passed through the unit from so many sources."

Grateful visitors who can afford to do so make donations to the unit, with over £400 being donated by a single person. Great Linford Parish Council has also donated £1,000 to ensure that they are not short of supplies.

But the project is so much more than just giving out food, said Peter.

"Both Lee and Lesley keep an eye on their more vulnerable customers as well as keeping the spirits up of everyone who goes by. The two ensure that they keep in constant contact by phone or food deliveries with previously regular visitors to The Little Bookshop, such as 92-year Ed Londy, a retired flight simulator

engineer, who suddenly found himself isolated in his home since the lockdown but who now receives regular calls, hot food deliveries and most importantly, his newspaper, from Lee and Lesley."

The dynamic duo are also providing food for the nuns and monks at the Willen Peace Pagoda, as well as people who can't leave their homes or have no support network.

"This has highlighted that there is so much need out there and the worry is what is going to happen to these people when the services are scaled down after the virus and things return to normal?" said Peter. "Will these people be left to fend for themselves, living hand to mouth once again?"

Though much of the food that The Little ‘Bookshop’ serves has been donated, the centre has also had to dip into its own funds to purchase food as required.

A JustGiving crowdfunding page has been set up to replenish some of the centre's funds to enable more support to be provided to the local families.

You can donate here