£366k cash boost an early Christmas present for Leeds Neighbourhood Networks

Hard-working Neighbourhood Networks across Leeds have been given a festive funding boost of more than £366,000.

The early Christmas present will see nine Neighbourhood Network projects each given a share of £366,826 after they were invited to apply for the money by Leeds City Council’s Adult Social Care team.

The extra funding will be used to help the Neighbourhood Networks provide support and day opportunities for local older people and their carers. It will also be used to expand projects to combat poverty, isolation and loneliness and help forge closer links with GP’s as well as helping to develop a volunteer driver scheme in the Wetherby area.

Among those being given funding are West Park-based Supporting the Elderly People (STEP) who have been awarded £65,650 and Action for Gipton Elderly, who will receive £54,000.

Councillor Adam Ogilvie, Leeds City Council’s executive member for adult social care, said: “Making this extra money available to our Neighbourhood Networks shows just how much confidence we and our partners in health have in the vital services they provide to local elderly residents.

“Neighbourhood Networks are a genuine lifeline to the thousands of people across Leeds who regularly attend some of the activities they provide, receive support in their own home and are helped to access other community activities.

“This extra money will be a massive boost to the already excellent work done by the networks and will mean they can offer even better support to older people, their carers and local communities.”

As part of the new funding arrangement, Adult Social Care are providing a total of £300,000 to Neighbourhood Networks each year. A one off payment from Leeds’ Clinical Commissioning Groups further boosted the amount of extra funding available for individual groups by £66,000 per year.

Dr Andy Harris, clinical chief officer for NHS Leeds South and East CCG and Chair of the Citywide Transformation programme, said: “We are committed to improving integrated care in Leeds and the Neighbourhood Networks have a key role to play in this.

“I am delighted that by working with our partner clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) in Leeds – NHS Leeds North CCG and NHS Leeds West CCG – we have been able to support this initiative that will help keep older people safe and healthy over the Christmas period.”

Leeds currently has 37 Neighbourhood Networks across the city which have long-term contracts with the council.

The networks provide services that support older people to stay living in their own homes for as long as possible. They are supported by 1,862 local volunteers, and provide on-going support to 21,966 older people.