City Gate Construction (CGC) has launched its afternoon tea initiative to help housing providers treat their senior citizen tenants.

‘Afternoon Tea with CGC’ is designed to provide a financial helping hand to housing associations and housing co-operatives.

The aim is to encourage them to host afternoon tea events as a way of valuing senior citizen tenants and to fight loneliness and isolation in communities.

Paisley-based CGC is a large construction company which is well known in the industry for its social justice credentials.

It firmly believes profitable businesses like CGC must give something back to communities to tackle poverty, unemployment and support regeneration activities.

Now housing providers are being invited to apply for £200 each to fund afternoon tea sessions after one of Scotland’s leading housing providers held a hugely-successful afternoon tea.

Thenue Housing in Glasgow organised the well attended afternoon tea session for its senior tenants last autumn – prompting CGC to follow Thenue’s brilliant idea.

Thenue also used the occasion to gain a deeper understanding of its senior tenants as it develops its “older person’s strategy” and it was given an overwhelming thumbs up by those attending.

In light of this and as a thank you for blazing the trail, Thenue is to be exempted from the application process and given £200 for its next afternoon tea event while a further six grants of £200 will be awarded to others whose applications are successful.

City Gate Construction managing director, Leo Reilly, said: “We want to celebrate the contribution senior citizens make – and have made – to our communities. And what better way to do that than encourage housing providers operating at the heart of these communities to host afternoon teas.

“Traditional afternoon teas are great occasions for those in later life to get together for companionship and to fight isolation and loneliness. And we think that is something worth supporting.”

CGC will even send the winners ‘pop-up’ brightly coloured cardboard cake stands to make sure the events have an authentic afternoon tea feel.

What CGC is now asking housing providers to do is to email or write to CGC telling the firm their plan for afternoon tea. It doesn’t need to be long – just an outline of how it is intended to make it a success.

Then email it over to afternoontea@citygateglobe.com or if preferred send it by post to ‘Afternoon Tea with CGC’, City Gate Construction Ltd, 24 MacDowall Street, Paisley PA3 2NB. This email address can also be used if there are any questions. CGC will then select the best ones as winners.

Closing date for applications is Tuesday January 31. The rules of the competition can be found on the news page of the CGC website.