How a grant from Barclays is helping people in Yorkshire get connected digitally

Aireborough Voluntary Services to the Elderly (Avsed) works to prevent the social isolation of the over 60s across Aireborough.

“Some people lost their voices because of not talking to anyone,” says volunteer engagement officer Michelle Phillips. “For some it was not going to the pub or hanging out at friends’ houses. For some people their entire social community has gone.”

Ms Phillips says being given eight portable tablets, as part of an initiative called Everyone Connected, backed by a £100,000 grant from Barclays, has been “invaluable”.

The tablets allowed people to be filmed dancing to celebrate International Day of Older Persons and have the first virtual get together in months.

She said: “We got someone to edit it and then did a Zoom with 40 people on.

“It was pandemonium for the first 20 minutes, people seeing friends they hadn’t seen for six months. It connected people back to Avsed, and their social circles.”

The tablets have now gone to eight people, aged from 72 to 90, pre-set with essentials like Zoom and Google.

Blow-by-blow instructions have been dropped through letterboxes with advice over the telephone or even shouted through a window, because of pandemic restrictions.

“We wouldn’t have been able to fund this ourselves,” said Ms Phillips, explaining that the charity lost the income it normally raises through holding sessions.

“Barclays giving this out is fantastic. For older people who have lost pretty much everything that is normal to them, community and social interaction, this is truly invaluable.”

The tablets are distributed by Sheffield-based Good Things Foundation which has been working for nearly a decade to help people become better connected digitally.

The largest digital inclusion programme in the UK, the foundation has helped over one million people.

The Everyone Connected scheme is targeting more than 400 digitally excluded households without access to the internet.

Good Things arranges for tablets with data lasting up to a year to be sent out to disadvantaged people via community networks up and down the country, like Avsed.

More than 10,000 devices have been sent out this year - including to a 91-year-old from Stockport who was able to video call her daughter in Australia who she had not seen for 25 years.

The vast majority say it has made a real difference to their life - with 89 per cent saying they have had a positive impact.

“The device alone isn’t the solution,” said Angela Ellis, the charity’s Head of Digital Social Inclusion Delivery.

“It’s also about having connectivity and having access to advice and support.

“People are using them for things like accessing the GP, completing a universal credit journal and keeping in touch with loved ones.

“Isolated mums have been using it to access fitness classes - and one guy who had never used it before was using it to check his Premium Bonds.

“Before people were able to muddle through - they may have used a library or another community centre.

“But in the middle of lockdown that was not possible.”