On this day in 2016, when we became a charity, we had already helped to establish 15 befriending schemes across England and one in Guernsey. Since this time, we have been excited to see the number of partnerships with local churches and Christian groups growing significantly. We are now working with over 60 partners and it has been a real privilege to serve the church in this way to address loneliness and social isolation on a local level.

During these five years, over 2,000 referrals have been made to local schemes and over 1,100 volunteers linked to a scheme member for a regular visit or phone call. We are always inspired to hear of the difference that these regular interactions often make in the lives of those involved such as the example below.

There have been a number of highlights since we began this work and we thought we would take this opportunity to celebrate some of these. This timeline shows some of the key developments and achievements in the past five years. We would like to thank all of our partners, coordinators and their local volunteers for all of their hard work in establishing and running local schemes which are making such a difference in the lives of those involved.

Our vision is to help set up a befriending scheme in every community of the UK where it is needed, and it has been exciting to see schemes such as these being set up and effectively serving those in local communities who otherwise would have little or no contact with other people during their week.