“SO, tonight, we should have been giving out ballot boxes ready for the local election count,” says Diane, a council employee who usually works in the democratic services department.

Instead, she’s helping to coordinate food parcels for the borough’s most vulnerable.

Diane is one of the many local government employees whose role has been totally upended by the COVID-19 pandemic. Their usual work has been put on hold. Now they’re helping out on the front line.

Alongside a team of volunteers – more than 700 people signed up in the weeks after the lockdown was announced – they are providing a slew of new services as the borough tries to come to terms with the lockdown.

These include everything from food parcels to dog walking to mental health support.

In one month alone, the council has received more than 2,000 calls on its dedicated helpline.

This work is coordinated largely through the town hall’s local hubs – nerve centres of activity where staff and volunteers are matched up with tasks in their area.

The team across the borough say that they are fortunate that the council already provides its services through what it calls a ‘place-based model’.

It meant that managers coordinating the support effort already understand the profile of each area – the kind of services it needs and the local support networks that are already available.

Lin Hogan is a manager at Leigh’s hub, with its two dozen or so staff working out of Leigh’s library.

She says the support from businesses has been particularly heartening.

In the first few weeks of the pandemic – what now feels like a lifetime ago – supermarket stockpiling led to a food supply issue for those who needed it most.

“People were stockpiling and the really vulnerable people couldn’t get the supermarket slots,” Lin remembers.

It was then that Morrisons came forward with a doorstep delivery, she says, while local suppliers – farm shops and businesses – also came on board to help out.

As we enter the third month in lockdown, access to food has remained the biggest concern for residents. Coordinating the food parcels makes up a large chunk of the hubs’ work.

One volunteer, Beverley, says: “A lot of people are self-isolating and maybe don’t have anyone or don’t want to ask anyone.”

“We had one person say: ‘I don’t want to bother my granddaughter, she’s a front line worker.” 

So now, many of the people who typically work behind the desk at the town hall – including Diane – are finding themselves out and about in their allocated area, preparing and delivering food parcels.

The council is currently providing some 3,000 food deliveries each week.

Many of these are provided to people on the shielded list – residents deemed to be most at risk from the virus and who have been told to stay indoors.

Lin says that the programme – which had to be set up in lightning-quick time – has not been without its challenges, as conflicting information has led to more people turning to the council for support.

“There was a lot of confusion around the shielding list,” says Lin, who said that conflicting information from the government, GPs and other sources left people unsure of whether they should go out or not. 

“People who have been handling the calls have been getting people on the shielding list,” she said.

There’s also been a fair bit of trial and error, she says, in terms of how the scheme has worked.

But the coordinated support that the hub system provides has allowed the team to deal with wider issues that have cropped up along the way.

For example, the hub teams have been able to tackle long queues at the pharmacy by doing medication pick-ups for several residents.

It means that instead of having eight different people queuing for eight different neighbours outside the chemist, one person can do a round for everybody.

While the hubs say their local knowledge has helped them get support to those who need it, the lockdown has also encouraged people who wouldn’t usually engage with council services to reach out, Lin says.

She recalls one man who called asking for more information on cycling in the borough; 

“But now the call handlers call him twice a week to have a chat about his mental health,” she says.

“There’s been a lot of hidden people. People who aren’t known to services who are struggling.

What we’re finding now is that a lot more hidden people have come forward who wouldn’t necessarily seek out support.”

And although the borough was fortunate to have a place-based model prior to the pandemic, Diane says that the enthusiasm that has been shown by the team has made the process work even better.

“We’ve got people who do finance for a living – now you’re seeing them now emptying potatoes for the food parcels.”

“We’ve always been allowed to take the bull by the horns. So it was a case of ‘you’re needed here can you go?

“And you’ve got your coat on before they finish asking.”