When the Prime Minister announced last March that we were going into lockdown, I will always be grateful for the text message from a local charity chief executive which simply said: ‘We can work this out together’.

Two days later, ten charity chief executives met with the leader of the council and our cabinet member for communities and public health. In under an hour we had a plan: a web form to call for public volunteers and two charities collaborated to initiate a volunteer matching service. Within days there were hundreds of volunteers placed into pools based on experience, locality and availability. The voluntary sector quickly became part of the Buckinghamshire COVID-19 cell, matching volunteers to the council’s support hub and bolstering local community groups.