Horden Newspaper caught up with Gemma one of parish officers, supporting the new warm spaces group at Horden Welfare Centre on Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday. We asked everyone how they found out about the warm spaces and two residents proudly pulled out the timetable from the Horden Newspaper. I sat down in the chatty room at Horden Welfare to fight off many kind offers from volunteers for a bacon sandwich, but settled for a cuppa.

Gemma, please tell us what warm spaces is about? “Warm spaces is a friendly, no questions asked welcoming space made for anybody that may need to find somewhere warm outside of the house. People here have made some new connections. Another person from the group then told me “ its about seeing a friendly face”. Gemma continued, “As a resident myself, it has made me realise about issues we all face like the social isolation. Some people who have moved here may have not had the best welcome or may not know people. Warm Spaces has provided a space for us to bring new community members together and give them the space to show them a warm Horden welcome. We saw these spring up around the country and thought that Horden could really benefit from this initiative”.

A Horden resident told me, “We found out about the space through this paper which I collected from the Hub House - I was looking for something like this in the area. I was going insane at home alone. I moved here 5 months ago, I moved here because of the price of rent - its the cheapest place to live in England. I do live by myself not knowing anyone up here - The warm space has been very quiet at first but has grown with who is coming along”.

I’ve learned about other things happening in the village from coming along to the warm space sessions and even visited the salvation army session on Friday.

Volunteers are absolutely vital to the services supporting communities locally in all of the work that they do. Volunteers come from a whole variety of backgrounds but all share the goal of giving time and skills to the communities they live and love. Volunteers are provided with full training, support and expenses. There are plenty of roles to suit you and the time that you may have to spare, like: Food Crisis Volunteers, drivers, befriending telephone volunteers, pathfinders, debt advisors, budgeting coaches and event support volunteers.

For an chat about volunteering or to find out more call Colin 0191 569 3511

Recently The Sunday Times published an article featuring Seaham Hall and advertising the area as a great place to stay and take in some of the amazing walks right here on the doorstep in Horden. Starting with Horden beach they suggest taking the eight mile walk up the beach passed Easington Colliery and maybe catching the train back.

Over 420 children were helped with a gift bag

30 adults with gifts

18 meals on Christmas Day to people that would normally be on their own 180 food parcels were given out in December Angela from the Salvation Army said - we couldn’t do it without the generosity of the general public and help of volunteers. Thank you so much for making a difference to someone’s Christmas Day.