Bellingham: GLL Leisure centre hosts "free food giveaway"
GLL Leisure Centre hosted food redistribution charity The Felix Project, which gave away 4.5 tonnes of produce to local residents and community groups.
The Felix Project is a London-based charity that collects good quality, surplus food from the food industry and redistributes it for free, via community centres and food banks.
Its aim is to reduce waste and tackle food poverty.
The project gave away 4.5 tonnes of food at Thursday's event to 180 local residents, including churches and faith groups who planned to use the produce for cooking community meals.
The charity collects or receives food from hundreds of suppliers including supermarkets, wholesalers, farms and restaurants.
It has run similar, successful giveaways at "Better" leisure centres in New Addington, Britannia and Burnt Oak.
Bellingham Leisure and Lifestyle Leisure centre is run by charitable social enterprise GLL under the ‘Better’ brand, in partnership with Lewisham Council.
Lewisham councillor Louise Krupski (Deputy Mayor and Environment, Transport and Climate Action) came to the event and expressed her enthusiasm for helping with future collaborations.
Matthew Houghton, GLL’s Community Sport Manager for Lewisham, said: “We have received nothing but positive feedback from this event and Felix are keen to work with us on delivering another event in the future.
“By the time the two-hour slot ended, we had managed to give away all of the potatoes and carrots, with a small amount of cabbages and bananas leftover. These won't go to waste.
“A massive well done to all of those involved to ensure the smooth and successful running of this event.”
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