Gloucester City Council and Gloucester Culture Trust will postpone the Bright Nights season of events due to take place in January and February until later in 2021.

Following consultation with the organisers and artists, the decision was made due to the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic and the latest national lockdown with ‘Stay at Home’ restrictions in place. All the projects that were scheduled to take place between now and the end of March have been postponed until the end of the year. 

The postponement means that a bigger and brighter series of Bright Night’s events can take place later this year. 

The council and the culture trust are currently working with partners on wellbeing packs for local residents with some of the packs themed around Bright Nights allowing people to engage with the project safely from home. The packs will include a range of boredom-busting activities to encourage creativity, physical activity and fun over the coming weeks.

If you are due to have a Covid-19 vaccination, it will speed up the process at the vaccination site if you know your NHS number in advance.

You can find your NHS number in most documents or letters sent to you by the NHS, such as your:

• prescriptions
• test results
• hospital referral letters
• appointment letters

Gloucester City Council is urging Businesses and residents severely financially impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic to find out if they are eligible for government support.

Gloucester City Council has been distributing grants to people on low incomes who are unable to work due to self isolation as well as to businesses who qualify under a range of grants that are be made available by government to meet the evolving situation. 

Businesses which had to close during the November lockdown or hospitality businesses, hotels, bed and breakfasts, those in leisure and events or the direct supply chain for these businesses who remained open but with reduced trading during the November lockdown, who have not yet submitted a grant application for that period, are encouraged to do so.

A number of other grants are being processed and further support grants are soon to be made available. 

Businesses are urged to keep checking the Council website to see if they qualify. 

Residents on low incomes who have been unable to work because they are self isolating can also apply for financial assistance. 

Those who meet the criteria, and have been provided with an eight-character account reference from the NHS Test and Trace Service, will be eligible for a one-off payment of £500.

Applicants must:

·  have been told to stay at home and self-isolate by NHS Test and Trace, either because they have tested positive for coronavirus or have recently been in close contact with someone who has;

·         are employed or self-employed;

·       are unable to work from home and will lose income as a result; and

·       are currently receiving Universal Credit, Working Tax Credit, income-based Employment and Support Allowance, income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance, Income Support, Housing Benefit and/or Pension Credit.

Anyone who thinks they may qualify should please visit the Support Payment webpage.

During the latest lockdown, if pupils cannot get access to the internet due to lack of broadband or not enough data, phone companies are offering data boosts.

You can find out more here.

I posted recently that I was having problems with my council number.

This now seems to be working again.

Here are the various ways to contact me.

Phone and online methods are the fastest methods, as always.

Work will be starting this year to bring fibre broadband to Gloucester.

Some residents in Gloucester will already have had letters through their door about this.

You can also go to www.cityfibre.com/your-street and register your interest.

During lockdown it can still be possible to improve your fitness. I definitely intend to!

Here is a list of online workouts you can do for free. I hope you find it useful.

As many parents go back to homeschooling during lockdown, there are various sources of advice and resources online.

Here are some tips on homeschooling from the BBC.

There was also this helpful announcement recently from BBC TV:

Starting on Monday 11 January, each weekday on CBBC will see a three-hour block of primary school programming from 9am, including BBC Live Lessons and BBC Bitesize Daily, as well as other educational programming such as Our School and Celebrity Supply Teacher and much loved titles such as Horrible Histories, Art Ninja and Operation Ouch.

BBC Two will cater for secondary students with programming to support the GCSE curriculum, with a least two hours of content each weekday.

Full story here.

This latest lockdown will hit some people harder, coming after a tough 2020 and in a month when people are normally thinking about new beginnings, resolutions etc.

It’s a really good idea to reach out to your family, friends and neighbours to check in on them and let them know that people are there if they need.

I will definitely be doing the above in my community. Why don’t you give one or all of the five pledges a try. #GloucesterCan

The chancellor has just announced £4.6billion of new grants to support businesses during the new lockdown.

You can find the details of these here.

Please get in touch if you need help in accessing these.