How Locality Improvement Framework funding is helping a Staffordshire table tennis club give isolated and bereaved older people a reason to get out of the armchair.

Twice a week, a hall in Staffordshire fills with the pock-pock of ping pong balls, the scrape of chairs and above all, laughter. Bat and Chat is a table tennis club, but ask anyone who comes along and they’ll tell you it’s about far more than the game.

“The best thing down here, you’ll see for yourself, is the laughter. The communication,” says one of the club’s founding members, John Quinn. “It’s more like a therapy group, really.”

Thanks to funding from the Locality Improvement Framework (LIF), delivered by Support Staffordshire, this small community club has been able to keep its doors open, its prices low and its members equipped to keep playing – and the impact on people’s health and wellbeing has been immense.

Eight years, and still growing

Bat and Chat started on 30th January 2016, in the basement of Salem Church, with four volunteers. At the very beginning, there was around three or four people who came each week and now that’s developed into what the club is today.

The club kept going all the way through the COVID-19 pandemic, sticking to strict government guidance – tables spaced out, six people to a table, sanitising between sessions – and still welcomed around 15 people each week “because they felt it a safe environment”. Demand kept growing, so a second weekly session was added on Wednesdays.

Around three years ago, the club moved to its current, more accessible home at Cheslyn Hay Parish Council Village Hall.

“It’s the best thing we’ve ever done, and they’ve been very good to us,” says John.

Today, both the Wednesday and Thursday sessions are fully booked, with 24 people at each. That’s 48 people a week, from when they started at just three or four people.

More than a game

Bat and Chat was set up to tackle isolation and loneliness among older people, and it shows: most members are over 60, with an average age of around 70, and the club is a mix of both men and women. Nobody is here to smash a winning shot, as our main priority is to create laughter.

What matters is who turns up. By the organisers’ own estimate, many members have been through bereavement, illness or isolation of some kind.

“There’s a lot of widows,” says John, “and if we can provide these sort of facilities and give them a purpose to get out of the armchair, what’s wrong with that?”

“She lost her husband, and she’s full of laughter now and that’s priceless, that is. Money can’t buy that.” – One of the club’s founders speaking about one of their members

Finding purpose again

For Dave, Bat and Chat arrived at exactly the right moment. Having moved to the area after his wife died, he found himself living with his son with little to fill his days.

“I’m sitting at home with nothing to do, so I phoned John,” he explains. Joining the club gave him far more than an afternoon out. “It’s had an impact on me, certainly, as I’ve now got something to do,” he says. “Organising this, I’ve joined the club, playing table tennis – it’s given me a stimulus. It’s given me a purpose.” Dave is now one of the volunteers who helps keep the club running week in, week out.

George, 87, tells a similar story. Two years ago, his wife passed away, and after caring for her for many years, he was suddenly on his own.

“After six months, my son said, Dad, you’ve got to get out and do something,” he remembers. “So, by chance, I saw this table tennis club, and I’ve never looked back.” Nervous about that first phone call, George now describes the club’s organiser as his best friend, and plays twice a week – as well as walking around three miles each day and joining the bowls club that has formed from the Bat and Chat group. “I’ve never had so many friends as I’ve got in this club,” he says.

Where the LIF funding made the difference

Running a thriving community club on very little money is no small feat, and the founders are candid about how much LIF funding has helped. “This funding has been immense for us, immense,” says one. “We were struggling financially.”

The LIF funding helped to cover essential equipment: 30 new bats and balls, costing nearly £1,000, after members shared a limited supply and wait their turn to play.

They have also received funding from South Staffs District Council Best Medicine Fund that helped with rising running costs and community activities: £500 towards the club’s increased rent, and £500 for support for members to socialise together outside of table tennis. Later in the year, 46 members are heading out for a carvery, each subsidised by £7, and this Christmas, sessions will be free for everyone. “Everything, nonprofit, all goes back,” John explains. “This is why the funding has been so, so rewarding for us.”

Crucially, the funding has also meant the club hasn’t had to raise its £3 session price, which covers refreshments costing around £50 every two to three weeks. “As long as you’ve got these people coming in, you don’t want to put the prices up. That funding has helped keep the prices low for at least eight months.”

Staying strong, living stronger

Beyond the friendships and the laughter, members are clear that Bat and Chat keeps them physically well too. “It helps with their strength, balance and core,” says John. “It’s also exercise, so it helps with physicality, your heart, and stuff like that.” One member, unable to play at the moment, still comes along for the company. “I enjoy it,” they say. “I don’t want to stop at all. It’s the social side. It’s going out.”

The club takes welcoming new members seriously. Volunteers hold DBS checks, and the club has health and safety policies, public liability cover and risk assessments in place. Newcomers are given a full induction – covering everything from fire extinguishers to first aid kits – and their first week is free, so anyone can try it without pressure. “The effort is to come and make them welcome and part of the group, so we don’t isolate them in any way,” John says.

A winning team

From three or four people meeting in a church basement to a club serving nearly 50 people a week, spinning off social groups for bowls, and beer and skittles, and running its own carvery nights and Christmas events, Bat and Chat’s growth over eight years speaks for itself. Credit, though, is something the founders – John, Barry, Dave and Ray – are quick to deflect. “We find it rewarding,” one says. “Seeing everyone in there with a cup of tea, having a laugh – that’s what it’s about.”

It’s a simple, powerful reminder of what LIF funding is designed to do: back community-led projects that make a real difference to people’s health and wellbeing. For the members of Bat and Chat, that difference is measured not in league tables, but in friendships made, afternoons no longer spent alone, and people who, in George’s words, have “never looked back.”

Find out more

The Locality Improvement Framework (LIF) funding helps community groups, charities and social enterprises across the county run projects that improve local health and wellbeing.

To find out more about current funding opportunities, visit our website or get in touch with the Support Staffordshire team.