Meals on Wheels grind to a halt

The new service has been welcomed by pensioner's charities

Forty years of tradition has ended after Aberdeenshire scrapped its "Meals on Wheels" service.

A commercial company is instead to provide frozen food for pensioners to heat up in a microwave themselves.

The move follows research showing most of its 700 elderly clients wanted to have their lunch when they felt like it instead of at set times every day.

Aberdeenshire Council had been one of only a few in Scotland still offering the service.

The new method will see frozen meals delivered to pensioners which can be stored in the freezer and heated up whenever they want.

Meals on Wheels volunteers had previously delivered a fresh, hot meal at set times every day.

'Nutritional value'

Colin Mackenzie, the council's social work director, said the new system would be healthier as well as more flexible.

He said: "We evaluated the nutritional value of Meals on Wheels and discovered that in many instances they didn't provide exactly what older people require.

"People who have meals delivered also might not eat them at that time but instead they might leave them and reheat them later so there are issues about food safety."

Meals on Wheels had been delivered by the Woman's Royal Voluntary Service. The organisation said the end of the 40-year service was a "sad day."

But the move was supported the Age Concern Charity, which said most pensioners are in favour of being able to choose their own meal times.