The City of Stirling provides a highly successful Meals on Wheels service to residents who are aged or have a disability through its Food Services unit, the largest in the Southern Hemisphere.
The City prides itself on being able to deliver over 610 freshly cooked, nutritious and innovative meals daily, which cater for various dietary requirements and are often the main source of nutrition for many clients. The service is funded under the Home and Community Care (HACC) program.
The City also provides a total of 27,000 meals per annum to other local authorities including Mundaring, Swan and Bassendean; thus supporting Home and Community Care clients in other areas. The City would like to further extend services to other Councils in the region to make the provision of Meals on Wheels even more cost effective.
A two-course meal is provided to Meals on Wheels clients seven days a week, with friendly volunteers delivering the meals every morning. The service utilises the ‘Cook Chill’ method to prepare meals, which ensures freshness and is considered to be more nutritious than frozen meals.
There are around 35-40 different combinations of meals provided on a rotational basis, 30 per cent of which are specialised to meet dietary and cultural needs. The service has an extremely high satisfaction rate of 97 per cent.
Over 210 volunteers have been recruited and assist Community Services staff to deliver meals each day.
For many people, the service is their main opportunity for social interaction and is highly valued.
Through the Meals on Wheels service, the City aims to help residents who are aged or have a disability maintain their independence and provide reassurance, as volunteers are trained to identify any health or social support needs during a meal delivery.
In this way volunteers provide an invaluable social support to their community.
