Hostel helps with Christmas cheer

Steve Orme
BBC News Derby

Tom has nothing but praise for the Padley staff

Tom Kinder believes this Christmas holiday will be the best one he has had in the last few years.

Tom, 53, who is homeless, will spend the festive season in a hostel run by the Padley group.

The organisation is a Derby-based charity working with deprived and excluded people.

"The last three Christmases haven't been that good. This is the first proper Christmas I've had inside where it's been really warm," said Tom.

Living rough

The hostel has single bedrooms for ten people and is always full. Residents should stay for four months but are often there longer because of a lack of alternative accommodation.

Tom was living rough in either a caravan or a tent on a farm at Hulland Ward before moving to the Becket Street hostel 10 weeks ago.

"I kept ringing up twice a day before I got a place," he said.

It's an organisation that would leave Derby a much poorer city if it ever stopped Amanda Page, chief executive

Tom became homeless when he was thrown out of his flat in Ripley after getting behind with his council tax.

"But I didn't know about all the benefits I could have had. Now I'm a lot wiser. I've learned quite a lot about what I can claim since I've been living here."

Formerly a lorry driver, Tom turned to doing odd jobs on farms because he has problems walking and also has arthritis in his fingers.

He has nothing but praise for the Padley staff: "They're very nice and are there to help. If you've got a problem you can go to them. They don't judge you on your past."

Apart from the hostel, the Padley group runs a day centre which is open 365 days a year providing homeless people with food, a hot shower and clothing, a development centre which offers training to people with learning and physical disabilities, a recycling operation which reprocesses textiles and a charity shop.

A couple of staff and nine volunteers will be working in the day centre on 25 December.

Community hub

"We have to turn volunteers away on Christmas Day," said chief executive Amanda Page.

The Padley group is funded by Derby City Council, the city's primary care trust, churches and private donors.

"It's a struggle for funding. That's our enemy and our challenge," said Miss Page.

"We just about break even. It's an organisation that would leave Derby a much poorer city if it ever stopped.

"I sometimes think it's the hub of the community. Organisations come and go but Padley will always be here."

Set up in 1985 by a group of nuns as just a drop-in centre, the Padley group will soon be reverting to its Christian values.

"That will be a struggle for some people," said Miss Page. "The organisation takes a humanistic view of people. To me that's wrong. The God slot is not there any more. I think it needs to be."