FOCUS SOCIAL VALUE
It’s been almost
four months since
the agreement with
the Taliban to leave
Afghanistan came into
force, where thanks to the stellar
work of many organisations and
individuals, including the British
Armed Forces and humanitarian
charities, thousands of people from
Afghanistan were able to travel
safely to the UK to start their new
lives. However, given the fast pace
of the evacuation, which took place
over less than two weeks, many
people arrived having le most
of their belongings behind. As a
result, it was imperative for Britain
to welcome these people with open
arms, by providing accommodation
and essential supplies, including
clothes, hygiene products and food,
whilst they get settled in the UK.
Organising and delivering this
support for thousands of people is no
easy task. As with the pandemic, it
required the public and private sector
to pull together, working closely
with the UK Government to arrange
accommodation and deliver supplies
for people arriving from Afghanistan.
With our sector’s experience of rolling
out COVID test centres and NHS ‘field
hospitals’ in a matter of days, the
FM industry has the expertise to be
front and centre of the eŽ orts to help
the families arriving in the UK from
Afghanistan. At Mitie, for example,
we created a dedicated management
team who mobilised hundreds of
security oŽ icers across the country in
a matter of days, as well as deploying
our intelligence experts and risk
analysts to ensure the safety of people
staying in the hotels arranged by the
Home OŽ ice.
TEAM EFFORT
With expertise in delivering complex
projects within very short time
frames, we were able to quickly meet
a logistical need when we were called
upon to help with an initiative. Carol
Weatherall and Ron Dennis CBE
(Founding Shareholder and former
Chairman and CEO of The McLaren
Technology Group), in collaboration
with Wellington College, where they
are both parents, instigated and led a
huge initiative to collect and organise
vital donations for Afghan adults and
children being relocated across the
UK. The family, Wellington College
staŽ , students, and parents, along
with many volunteers from the local
community, came together
and collected and
organised 74,000
essential
items,
including
clothes,
bedding,
household
goods and
toiletries.
The
donations
were collated
into over 2,200
‘Welcome Care
Packages’ to support the
Afghan community.
The generosity was overwhelming,
with enough Welcome Care
Packages to fill the equivalent of
nine articulated lorries. When Ron
Dennis approached Mitie, we were
delighted to be able to provide the
logistical solution in delivering such
vast volumes of donations. Cadets
from The Royal Military Academy
Sandhurst also joined the eŽ ort. By
harnessing our professional network,
with support from our supply and
logistics partner Stronghold Global,
in just 24 hours we were able to
secure transport for these donations,
at a time of perhaps unprecedented
demand for the UK’s supply chain and
logistics industry.
In turn, Stronghold Global
were incredibly generous with
their support, by collecting and
transporting all the Care Packages to
their Swindon warehouse within just
48 hours. Stronghold Global, at their
own expense, are also distributing
packages throughout the UK to
people staying in the hotels arranged
by the Home OŽ ice, which Mitie are
securing.
This truly was a team eŽ ort with
people and businesses donating
their time and services to support
the eŽ orts. As James Dahl, Master
of Wellington College, said: “Over
the course of just seven days an
astounding 74,000 essential items
were donated, via the
Wellington College
Community,
ranging from
clothes, food,
electrical
equipment
and
bedding.
Wellington
College
staŽ ,
parents,
pupils and
local volunteers
meticulously sorted
and arranged the donations
into 2,295 ‘Welcome Care Packages’,
which were accompanied by heartwarming
and welcoming letters and
cards.
“Our hope is that our ‘Welcome
Care Packages’ will go some way to
providing the Afghan families with the
essentials that they need, a— er they
have lost so much, and as they now
begin their new lives.”
FURTHER HELP
I very much agree with the impressive
scale of the initiative and, more
importantly, about the need to help
the families that have been aŽ ected
by the crisis in Afghanistan. There is
always more that we can do to give
our support and, as such, we have
donated £20,000 to Breaking Barriers,
a charity which will be helping people
apply for asylum through the Afghan
Citizens Resettlement Scheme.
As they start to build new lives for
themselves, and their families, we
hope, over time, to oŽ er career
opportunities and welcome some of
these people to our own workforce.
And with COVID still to consider, we
also donated 10,000 facemasks and
over 3,300 litres of hand sanitiser to
charities supporting people that have
arrived from Afghanistan.
Given that a number of our
colleagues come from Afghanistan or
have served there as members of the
British Armed Forces over the past 20
years, we wanted to ensure that we
had support in place at a potentially
diŽ icult time for them. Through the
Mitie Military, our inclusion network
for employees who are veterans,
reservists or family members of
people in the Armed Forces, we hosted
sessions to oŽ er an open a space for
colleagues to talk about the issue.
Some of our colleagues needed
additional support and found this
time particularly challenging, so we
also dedicated significant eŽ orts to
making sure that employees were
aware that Mitie’s Mental Health First
Aiders are there to lend a friendly
ear. And our Employee Assistance
Programme is available 24/7 to oŽ er
advice to colleagues, and their family
members, facing mental health issues,
encouraging people to reach out to
these support services as needed.
As with the COVID pandemic, the
crisis in Afghanistan has demonstrated
that many of the challenges Britain
may face in the future will require
that everybody, including local
communities, government and
businesses, work together to take
swi— action. Mobilising large projects
in a matter of days is what we do day
in, day out, as facilities management
providers, which is why our sector
can, and should, force for good in
supporting the UK in overcoming
whatever challenge may come next.
SAFE REFUGE From pandemic response to Afghan aid, Jason Towse, MD of Business Services at Mitie,
explains how the FM sector can play a leading role in helping the UK during times of crisis
44 DECEMBER/JANUARY 2022