The Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) is urging the Third Sector to get involved with the UK-wide #NeverMoreNeeded campaign, highlighting how important the voluntary sector has been to the Coronavirus response.
All organisations are struggling for funds, having to furlough staff and cut costs yet voluntary organisations, by their very nature have a duty of care to the people they support and many, the Centre included have adapted how they work to continue supporting vulnerable people through innovation and technology.
As part of the #NeverMoreNeeded campaign, volunteers, staff and service users are being asked to share their experience of the Covid-19 response in blogs and through articles on social media.
We have called on Centre User, Christine Moroney to provide her views on Newsline, Falkirk's Talking Newspaper for people with sight loss, of which Christine is the founder, how the closure of the service due to Coronavirus led to Forth Valley Sensory Centre stepping in to provide a weekly news podcast and the benefit that has delivered.
Christine's #NeverMoreNeeded blog
On Friday 13th November 1981 the first audio version of the Falkirk Herald was sent out to 30 local visually impaired people. This service progressed over the years from cassette tape to CD to USB memory stick. As I lost my sight at the age of 5, I had never read the local news so this was my first hand experience of accessing what was happening in my local area. I am a founder member of Newsline and have been chairperson for the past 30 years. When Newsline resumed our service after Christmas this year, we were hearing about a virus in China. Little did we know we would have our first cases of Covid 19 in Scotland at the beginning of March. Scottish and UK Governments started putting measures in place to stop the spread of the virus and due to this Newsline had to cease our weekly recordings on 19 March.
Jacquie Winning, Manager of Forth Valley Sensory Centre (FVSC) asked me if I thought it was a good idea for the Centre to set up a Podcast and post this online each week. I eagerly agreed and for the past six weeks, Jacquie together with Martin and Luke have been selecting main news stories, some important health information for visually impaired people, nostalgia and information from trusted sources. This is keeping service users of Newsline and FVSC in touch with local news. This week two regular users of FVSC and long time listeners of Newsline were absolutely delighted to receive the podcast on a memory stick as they are unable to access a podcast online #NeverMoreNeeded
As read/dictated by Christine Moroney
19 May 2020
Newsline Founder and Centre User at Forth Valley Sensory Centre
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