East Renfrewshire charities serve up a spectacular ‘Big Lunch’ to local residents

The Big ER Lunch is a community celebration, that brings people together with entertainment and a lovely lunch, and also helps them find out about services, activities and support.

This was the fourth successful event of its kind, with past events being in Barrhead, Mearnskirk and in Neilston.

Hosted by local disability campaigner Michael McEwan and Chair of East Renfrewshire Disability Action (ERDA) and Paul McIlvenny, Director of ICM2, the event saw magnificent performances from Eaglesham Primary Choir, The RAMH Choir, Acumen Drama Group an a very moving talk form local WW2 veteran Eric Dodds.

Alan Stevenson, Talking Points Co-ordinator for the East Renfrewshire Health & Social Care Partnership, shared information on local places in East Renfrewshire where residents can get information, advice and support from professionals and volunteers about their health and wellbeing. Other information sessions were delivered by Care & Repair, Social Security Scotland and VAER.

There was also a special visit from none other than Santa Claus himself!

The event is organised by award winning charity SDS Support Forum East Renfrewshire and partner organisations Voluntary Action East Renfrewshire (VAER), ERDA, Neilston Development Trust, Outside the Box and Neighbourhood Networks.

Veronica Dunn, SDS Forum East Renfrewshire said: “The Big ER lunch is an ideal forum to showcase many of the opportunities accessible locally. There is a great mix of information sharing as well as performances by entertainers and local groups. It’s a fun day out for all. We hope to be back with another event in June 2020 – watch this space!”.

The organisers would like to give a huge thank you to all the event sponsors and volunteers including ERC Housing, Scotmid, SDS Forum and Include Me 2.