Shocking impact of cost-of-living crisis on foodbank users revealed





Demand for non-perishable products by people using foodbanks is on the increase as they switch off their fridges and freezers due to the cost-of-living crisis and spiralling energy prices.

Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham made the remark at a graduation ceremony for graduates of our Transformational Leaders Programme, designed to help them transition from being ‘fitness and facilities’ managers to the vanguard of public health and wellbeing.

Mr Burnham told our two cohorts of graduates they had a key part to play in reaching out to communities where the crisis was so bad foodbank users were only seeking store cupboard foods such as dried pasta and tinned foods.

Mr Burnham said: “This is a huge community challenge for areas of Greater Manchester. Helping people to be active and supporting their wellbeing will be key to helping families and individuals to cope throughout this crisis.”

We want to inspire the region’s community leisure workforce to offer new ways of helping people across Greater Manchester live healthy, happy and fulfilled lives. Our programme has been created to empower our member-organisations’ staff to play a greater role in developing new wellness services and innovative, cross-sectoral responses to current and emerging population health needs.

Our programme will cover key topics that will help staff understand their role within the wider ecosystem and look at wellness, NHS and social care systems with a view to identifying more collaborative ways of working with other professionals and community groups.






“This is a huge community challenge for areas of Greater Manchester. Helping people to be active and supporting their wellbeing will be key to helping families and individuals to cope throughout this crisis.”

Andy Burnham





He called for closer links with GPs to generate exercise on prescription and social interventions, which would only ‘be taking money away from pharmaceutical companies, nobody else’ – his comments chiming with our ‘We Move as One’ strategy that seeks to encourage active lives, reduce health inequalities, and support those who need our help the most.

He also warned the impacts of the crisis threatened a ‘mental health pandemic’: “We must do more to promote physical activity linked to mental health, helping to lift the mood of individuals and communities,” he added.

We held the graduation ceremony at the Double Tree by Hilton in Manchester, where Mr Burnham also spoke about our award-winning Prehab4Cancer (P4C) programme, which recently won the Best Not for Profit Working in Partnership with the NHS award from the Health Service Journal, held in high esteem within the NHS for its focus on healthcare excellence.

P4C facilitates cancer patients to engage in exercise, nutrition, and wellbeing assessments and interventions before, during and after treatment. Since its inception in 2019, P4C has supported 3,500 patients in Greater Manchester in preparing for the physiological challenges of cancer treatments.

Mr Burnham referred to P4C as ‘mission critical’ with an opportunity to evolve the programme to support other long term health conditions and life-threatening disease.

Indeed, our strategy now is to extend the prehabilitation principle to more cancers, with a 10-year ambition to be treating up to 10,000 patients a year, and a workforce of approximately 80 exercise professionals with specialist knowledge to support them.

P4C Programme Manager, Kirsty Rowlinson-Groves told the said: “We want to be able to offer a prehab service to anyone in Greater Manchester who is diagnosed with cancer. We want to be embedded within all cancer pathways and ensure all patients have access to the programme. This will come with the use of the data we are collecting to build an evidence base and a case for further long term, sustainable funding.”

Find out more about Prehab4Cancer






“We want to be able to offer a prehab service to anyone in Greater Manchester who is diagnosed with cancer. We want to be embedded within all cancer pathways and ensure all patients have access to the programme. This will come with the use of the data we are collecting to build an evidence base and a case for further long term, sustainable funding.”

Kirsty Rowlinson-Groves, P4C Programme Manager





Our Transformational Leaders Programme is committed to the promotion of co-working between physical activity and clinical healthcare providers.

It is supported by GreaterSport and made possible with investment from the National Lottery, through the local pilot in Greater Manchester with Sport England. The programme has been designed and delivered in partnership with the training provider Future Fit Training, a learning and development organisation with more than 30 years of experience.

Our Chair, Andy King, said: “It is vital that staff across the community leisure sector understand much more about the wider community we serve and how we can better play our part in improving health and wellbeing services for everyone across Greater Manchester.”

The programme covers the principles of leadership, creating culture, understanding today’s leisure and wellness sector including key agendas, services, and organisations; whole system thinking, health inequalities, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and leading for renewal.

Elaine Briggs, Chief Education and Partnership Officer at Future Fit Training, said: “We believe this training is vital to ensure that we are creating leaders of the future who understand how they can influence change in their own communities and create a joined-up approach to health and wellness, while motivating their teams through dynamic and passionate leadership.”

 

Find out more about our Transformational Leadership Programme

Woman teaching transformational leadership session to group of people





“We believe this training is vital to ensure that we are creating leaders of the future who understand how they can influence change in their own communities and create a joined-up approach to health and wellness, while motivating their teams through dynamic and passionate leadership.”

Elaine Briggs, Chief Education and Partnership Officer at Future Fit Training







Interested in working with us?

We are actively seeking new partners, opportunities for collaboration and innovative ways of working.  We can’t do this alone. If our plans, purpose and intent chime with you, please do connect with us and be part of our transformational movement.