The Wheatley Foundation’s Emergency Response Fund was started a year ago

A lifeline fund set up a year ago to support people across Scotland through the pandemic has delivered emergency items to almost 7000 households in hardship.

Wheatley Foundation’s Emergency Response Fund was set up last April to support vulnerable individuals and families across south and central Scotland.

The foundation is the charitable trust of Wheatley Group, the country’s largest housing, care and property management organisation.

Almost 7,000 tenants and people in care from Dumfries and Galloway to Fife, and from Dumbarton to Leith, have received items ranging from fuel and mobile phone top-ups, furniture and white goods, such as cookers, fridges and microwaves, to pet food and gardening equipment.

The fund also provided children with colouring-in books and tablet computers, and parents with everything from baby milk and nappies to boredom buster activity packs.

More than £500,000 has been spent, including donations from Wheatley subsidiaries, contractors and suppliers and grants from Scottish Government, Barclays, the Lintel Trust and the supermarket Morrisons.

Irene Brown, from Hyvot Park, Edinburgh, received a new cooker through the fund.

She said: “It’s brilliant. It’s made life so much easier for me and I’m really grateful for the help.”

Children at Bankhead Primary in Knightswood, Glasgow, received new tablet computers to help their schoolwork.

Head teacher Celine McKinlay said: “The families are very grateful and the tablets will enhance the children’s learning.”

Referrals for help were passed to the foundation from Wheatley housing, care and property-management staff across the group.

Foundation manager Lynne Mitchell said: “The Emergency Response Fund has been a vital way to support customers when they needed us most.

“It demonstrated how quickly and how comprehensively Wheatley was able to mobilise and then continue to support the people it works for across Scotland.”