Hastings couple who help people in need receive award from Boris Johnson

Husband and wife Dominic and Alexandria Warren created Dom’s Food Mission in 2015 as a way of supporting vulnerable and disadvantaged households in Hastings, whilst also preventing surplus food from supermarkets and businesses going to landfill.

The charity regularly helps more than 4,000 people with food every month, but this year, in response to the pandemic, their work has expanded and at the peak of lockdown they were delivering more than 8,000 food parcels per month to households, preventing 35,000 tonnes of food going to landfill this year.

Dominic also created and runs a scheme through the charity called A Helping Hand, funded by the National Lottery, which takes surplus supermarket ingredients into schools for children to use in learning to cook, understand more about nutrition and healthy diets, and to help them with picking up other life skills.

In a personal letter to Dominic and Alexandria, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “Thank you both for your amazing work creating ‘Dom’s Food Mission’.

“For more than five years, and now through a pandemic, you have delivered meals on a staggering scale. You have put an astonishing 35,000 tonnes of food waste to good use, feeding thousands of people in your community.

“Christmas will be different this year and your food parcels and meals this festive season are more important than ever.”

Reacting to the Prime Minister’s announcement, Dominic and Alexandria said: “We’re so grateful and blessed to be recognised for this wonderful award and would like to thank everyone who’s involved, especially our hard working team. Thank you!”

Dominic and Alexandria are the 1,557th and 1,558th recipients of the Prime Minister’s UK daily Points of Light award, which was first launched in April 2014 to recognise outstanding individuals making a difference where they live.

Each day, someone, somewhere in the country is selected to receive the award to celebrate their remarkable achievements, including hundreds of volunteers who have been recognised for how they have served their communities through the Coronavirus pandemic.