A VAST VOLUNTEER ARMY HAS GATHERED ACROSS SCOTLAND TO MEET THE COVID 19 CRISIS. WHAT IT HAS ACHIEVED HAS BEEN REMARKABLE. IT IS A HUGE SOCIAL ASSET THE SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT REALLY MUST KEEP ALIVE.

23 March 2020 is a date which I don't suppose I will ever forget. It is locked in the brain. A moment fixed in time. I have been thinking about it quite a lot over the last few days as I have been driving around the wet fields and hills of Dumfries and Galloway.

The day everything changed. The day everything came tumbling down. The day the old world was suddenly done and dusted.

The day when it seemed like the First Base foodbank was well and truly stuffed.

For 17 years we had carefully built up a network which was capable of providing 600 people a month across our region with something to eat when they found themselves unable to go to the shops to buy anything. On a few occasions over the years things had gotten pretty precarious, mainly when our bank account started to have a Venezuelan look about it. One way or another, we always found a way through.

But this time ..... ?

This time it seemed we had arrived at a bridge too far. Everything had collapsed over the course of a couple of days.

To issue 600 food parcels a month you need quite a lot of food. I know. Duh.

Almost all of our food came from two sources. Donations from the public, mainly churches, and purchases from the supermarkets. On 23 March both of these options were as dead as Dodos. The public were locked behind closed doors and the supermarkets were rationing. Three tins of beans is not a lot of use when you are accustomed to having 150 tins a week delivered.

Two thirds of our parcels were collected from a wide variety of locations dotted across the region – libraries, offices, fellow charities. And now? Now they were all closed for the duration.

This was one half of the nightmare. The other half seemed even more impossible and daunting. For it was blindingly obvious demand for our service was about to completely explode. We thought it would probably double. As things turned out, it has quadrupled.

23 March seemed like a perfect storm. One option was to close the doors and accept the impossibility of the situation. Lots of front line charities did exactly that.

This wasn't a decision which detained us for very long. A vast food crisis was days away and one way or another we were going to do our best to meet it.

At this moment of absolute crisis, two very important things happened. Game changing things.

Up in Edinburgh, the Scottish Government committed a huge chunk of cash to the front lines of the coming social crisis.

I digested this and called up Rob Davidson, the deputy leader of Dumfries and Galloway Council.

Was the cash real? Yes, the cash was real. The Government had been crystal clear in its instructions to Scotland's local authorities. Get the money to where it is needed. Do it fast. Screw the bureaucracy. No fifty page forms. No complicated service level agreements. Just get the money where it needs to go and get it there fast.

So how fast will fast be?

No idea Mark, but we're going to bust a gut. So Rob, here's the big question, if we use up all our reserves in chasing this thing will you guys have our back?

Yes. Completely. Do everything you need to do and the money will be with you soon enough. You have our word on that.

Old school. A solid relationship between a front line charity and a local authority built up over many years. A solid relationship between a foodbank manager and an elected Councilor built up over many years. 

As in mutual trust. A promise made and a promise trusted.

So we got cracking and re-invented the First Base wheel. We bought freezers as if they were going out of fashion. We hired a big van. We hunted out local food manufacturers and wholesalers who could guarantee supplies. Pies and eggs and bread rolls and biscuits and milk and bags of spuds. We signed up a team of volunteers at Summerhill Community Centre to knock us up thousands portions of Scotch Broth and Pasta sauce.

Could we have done all this without the nailed on promise of financial support from Edinburgh? Not really. Not sensibly. It would have been crazy to blow through every penny we had to our name in a frantic attempt to keep up with the crisis. First Base will still be needed in 2021. And 2022. And 2023.

So. We had food supplies. Now we had to find a way to get them to the mouths which needed feeding. Nobody was about to collect. Everyone was locked behind closed doors and terrified of the invisible plague stalking the land. Instead we would have to deliver. 

Our existing satellite points were all closed for the duration. We needed new distribution points and we needed them in a hurry.

Within a week we had seven. Each had the use of a public building and a bunch of volunteers willing to do what was needed. Each and every one was a classic example of something happening from the bottom up. Our role soon became crystal clear. It was on us to source reliable supplies of food and to get them to the distribution points. Once there, the food would be parceled up and delivered to anyone who needed it. 

It soon became clear these new operations were going to be about much more than food. They started picking up and dropping off prescriptions. They went street by street to make sure the vulnerable were not forgotten. They called people up on the phone to make sure they were OK. Not deserted. Not left hanging.

The speed with which all of this came together was truly amazing. Heart warming. Inspiring.

And within a week the whole of Dumfries and Galloway was covered. Every square mile of our vast rural region was catered for. A huge volunteer army self mobilised over the course of a few March days in the midst of the country's greatest crisis in seventy years. And they said there was no such thing as society. Well. Not they. She. But let's not go there.

A couple of weeks later the money from Edinbugh did indeed arrive. Each and every one of the new hubs was given money to do what they were doing. Nobody told them what to do. Nobody claimed to know better than them. Nobody tried to impose demands and strings. Instead the money was used to oil the wheels.

Well 23 March is now a long time ago. First Base Base has managed to provide food enough to fill 10,000 emergency food parcels. And nobody has gone hungry in Dumfries and Galloway. Nobody has been left behind. Nobody has become colatoral damage.

The seemingly impossible has been achieved. The volunteer army has come through with flying colours.

I have no doubt the story of Dumfries and Galloway is the story of the whole of Scotland. In just a few months the country has added a whole new layer to the Welfare State. A new line in the sand. A new volunteer army which has proved itself in the midst of a nightmare.

In short, we suddenly have a priceless new asset. A social asset. An asset we will need for many months and years to come as the fallout from the crisis hits home.

When so many people have been involved in this social miracle, it seems almost wrong to put a focus on a single project. However the best way to show how something big is working is more often than not to focus on something small. Bite sized.

Like the town of Moffat and the wonderful Jane.

Moffat is a small, very Scottish town nestled in under round hills and just far enough away from the M74 to avoid the shake of the wagons. The high street is home to crafts and cakes. Tourists buy postcards. Poverty isn't much of a feature.

Our food parcels have been available to the good folk of Moffat for years and most of the time the good folk of Moffat haven't had much need of them. Ten parcels per month was about as busy as it ever got. Keeping up with Moffat demand wasn't overly taxing.

On 23 March, the local library closed down and we needed an alternative. Angela from our Management Committee came up with a freezer and organised us a berth in a church. A couple of volunteers made contact. It was bare bones, but hopefully it would be enough.

Then the phone rang and Jane's voice exploded from the earpiece. Does a mobile phone actually have an earpiece? Whatever. You know what I mean.

Jane is one of those force of nature people. She's all constant energy and enthusiasm. She told me she was from the Moffat Town Hall Development Trust and they were determined to step up and do their bit. We arranged to meet up and by the time I arrived the place was full of volunteers and local food donations had poured in. Her attitude to the crisis was pretty straight forward. We haven't done emergency food before but we will learn how to do it soon enough. 

And so they did. Within a month they were delivering a hundred emergency food parcels a week to a wide area around the town. Most of the people they are helping are families where the main bread winner has been furloughed. In the old normal, these were the working families who by hook or by crook just about made the incomings meet the outgoings. A 20% pay cut quickly forced their heads beneath the waterline. All of a sudden genuine poverty was a problem in and around Moffat. Well, thanks to Jane and her team nobody has had to go to bed hungry.

Lots of people have been involved in making all this possible and not a single one of them is being paid a penny. In all of its long history, the Town Hall can never have been more of a beating heart for its community.

But now Jane is having to look at a bunch of 'what next?' questions. She wants to keep on with the emergency food work, but it is complicated. Normally the Development Trust relies on booking out the main hall for much of its income. Right now the main hall looks like an emergency relief centre. The first tranche of Government funding has enabled them to step up to the plate. Now we are at the moment of 'what next?'. Will the Government up in Edinburgh keep on with the funding or will the well run dry?

You can do a lot with boundless enthusiasm, but there is a limit even Jane's upbeat energy can't overcome.

All of which means we have reached something of a moment. All over Scotland, hundreds and hundreds of Janes have built something amazing. Almost awe inspiring. We have an extraordinary social asset all ready and raring to help with the dark days to come. Thousands and thousands of huge hearted people who have done something quite remarkable in the midst of the biggest crisis Scotland has faced in years.

It is a social asset which is almost priceless. However it is a social asset which lacks a lobbying voice in the corridors of power. Which of course explains my motives for writing this. I don't suppose too many people will read these words. But I will do my damndest to get our local MSP's to give it a once over and to press for the high heid yins to carry on providing enough support to keep things going. And come on guys, think about it. When it comes to bang for the public buck, you'll never get better value. The new volunteer army goes without pay and not many armies are willing to do that.

And I suppose I have to face up to the fact Jane will also probably read these words and she's going to have my guts for garters the next time I show up in my van!