With Chester Pride’s main event being cancelled due to Covid-19, their volunteer committee set to work on bringing six projects to continue supporting the LGBT+ Community in Chester and Cheshire West.

These include Chester Digital Pride, an online event that will take place live on Saturday 8th of August 2020, on the Chester Pride Facebook Page and website along with some workshops on Zoom. The live digital pride will kick off at 10am with a program of events for children and young people that will run until 12pm (Several Safeguarding measures are in place for this and will be able to be found on their website www.chesterpride.co.uk). From 1pm onwards we will have performances, talks, workshops and live panel Q&A, all focusing on Trans & non-Binary topics. Then from 5:30pm the M&S Bank Mainstage takes over with a range of entertainment from local performers, celebrities, and international artists.

Along with Digital Pride, Chester Pride’s JUST ASK campaign is running to help with any LGBT+ issues, such as mental health, physical abuse, employment issues, sexual health, hate crimes, coming out, gender transitioning, and much more. Anyone that needs help can get in touch with Just Ask using the email: help@chesterpride.co.uk This project has been supported thanks to funding distributed from the National Lottery Community Fund on behalf of the Government, alongside the Cheshire Community Foundation and Steve Morgan Foundation.

Later this month our TAKE 5 with Chester Pride project is due to launch, promoting taking 5 minutes out of your day to focus on mental, physical and social health and wellbeing. We will offer tips and advice on wellbeing activity, and host online coffee mornings, with the aim of hosting regular in person coffee mornings when the situation allows.

Launching later in 2020 is THE BOX PROJECT, a UK Pride first. This project will offer free condoms and sanitary products for anyone to receive and use. At first it will be offered as an online service, before being placed in a large number of bars, café’s, restaurants, hotels and other public venues. The Box Project aims to help offer these products for people in need or just caught short when out with friends. The Box Project will also focus on alcohol and drug dependencies, hate crime, and domestic abuse with messages included in the packages, as well as promoting safe sex and sexual health. This project has been created thanks to funding from The Box Project partner Virgin Care.

GATHER ROUND will launch in the Autumn creating a number of groups that will help different members of the LGBT+ Community. These groups will create safe spaces for socialising, and getting access to key information on a wide range of issues, with workshops, guest speakers, and social events. These groups will help specific and vulnerable sectors of the LGBT+ with many issues that they still face.

And Finally, OUT & ABOUT will launch once it is safe to do so, as a social group, with monthly outings to local LGBT+ venues and place of interests, including coach trips further afield. Social isolation can be a huge issue the LGBT+ community can face, and Out & About will offer LGBT+ people the chance to grow their social bubbles through safe social events.

Chester Pride Chair Warren Lee said “The deliverance of these projects has been possible thanks to the hard work of our committee and project officers. These projects are fully funded by our sponsors M&S Bank, Bank of America, Bristol Myers Squibb, Virgin Care and community response funding from the Government, distributed through the National Lottery Community Fund. All of whom, even during Covd-19, have remained fully committed to our cause. Since the Covid-19 outbreak in February, we set to work on contingency plans for our main event, with Just Ask being the focus for 2020. However, since the outbreak brought about the cancelation of our main event and free family fun days in Grosvenor Park, this allowed us to focus on launching the other five projects that we wanted to launch. The Covid-19 crisis has allowed us to bring these parts of our five-year plan forward so we can offer support to the LGBT+ community when it is most needed. Covid-19 has allowed us to re-focus our efforts in making sure we are a voice and a go to for support, for the LGBT+ Community in Chester and the local area which for us at Chester Pride has always been our main focus and priority.”

More information on the six projects can be found on the website www.chesterpride.co.uk