Ian McKellen sits at a trestle table in a London East End church and begins to peel his third apple of the day. Looking dashing in his colourful scarf, he flashes his trademark devilish grin and chats to the other volunteers about “the art of peeling” as they prepare a hot roast with apple crumble to feed around 130 of the most vulnerable people in Tower Hamlets.
On his left is Phil, 52, a chartered accountant whose story of dramatic downward mobility is a salutary reminder of how poverty can happen to any of us — even middle-class people with white-collar professions. Phil earned a hefty £250,000 a year before the wheels fell off in 2022 due to severe mental health issues, including anxiety and depression, and he now has to feed himself on just £1.25 a day. On Sir Ian’s right sits Ausra, 48, a single mother who suffers from depression and must also get by on an impossible food and utilities budget of £10 a day for her and her two children, aged five and ten.
Both Phil and Ausra, and many of the dozen or so volunteers who have come along, say they would not survive were it not for the weekly food provided by this resilient little charity, Neighbours in Poplar — which in turn is supplied by one of the funded partners of our winter appeal, The Felix Project.
Our Winter Appeal
Our winter campaign — Who’s at Your Table? — in partnership with Comic Relief, is raising money to fund organisations in London and across the country helping people experiencing homelessness and food insecurity, and people who have been forced to flee their homes.
Sir Ian has come down to this uncelebrated corner of the East End to show his support for our joint campaign with Comic Relief, accompanied by his friend Evgeny Lebedev, proprietor of the London Standard. Their friendship goes back over 15 years to when Sir Ian was playing Estragon in Waiting for Godot and Evgeny met him to propose the idea of taking the play to the Moscow Art Theatre. Although the transfer never materialised, it led to them becoming friends and business partners, buying a historic Limehouse pub together — The Grapes — where Charles Dickens used to drink with his godfather.
Their visit comes as we publish our final campaign piece before Christmas with the news that the total raised has passed £2.6 million — thanks to donations of over £75,000 from members of the public, and a £50,000 boost from the Standard’s Dispossessed Fund. Other major donors so far include This Day Foundation, Sainsbury’s, the Julia Rausing Trust, Comic Relief, Lush co-founder Mark Constantine and The Ethos Foundation.
The money is going to charities in London and across the country helping the most disadvantaged groups, including refugees forced to flee their homes and people experiencing food insecurity and homelessness.
Neighbours in Poplar (NiP) is one of over 1,200 charities supplied by The Felix Project, but it is Sir Ian’s favourite. Ever since he was introduced to their charismatic founder, Sister Christine, by another of his friends, Michael Cashman — a fellow actor and now a Labour peer in the House of Lords — he has found time to occasionally join them for a spell of peeling and schmoozing.
“I first came down during Covid when they had just started preparing meals for local people in need," he says. "Christine's spirit is infectious and she is a bit bossy, insisting you come back the next week to peel again because there's a job to be done. It isn't a game, it's serious — lives are at stake."
“We were taught — or rather it was simply expected — to think beyond our family to the wider needs of the community”
For Sir Ian, who lives locally, NiP epitomises the spirit of Christmas and good neighbourliness. “What struck me when I started coming down is that although I've lived in this area 46 years, I am a visitor, an immigrant from up north, and some of the people sitting around the table today are immigrants from other countries — but all feel like they belong. I recognise that spirit from my childhood in Bolton where my father, a civil engineer, was a lay preacher in his spare time. We were taught — or rather it was simply expected — to think beyond our family to the wider needs of the community. That's why, when I come down here, I feel like I belong."
How you can help
£10 could contribute towards an emergency grant or food voucher for a young person in need
£10 could help provide a child forced to leave their home with a gift to open on Christmas
£45 could provide a refugee with two hours specialist career advice, supporting them to get employment
£150 could provide five families forced to leave their homes with food vouchers to enjoy a festive meal with loved ones and community
For Lord Lebedev, the physical location of NiP — with gleaming Canary Wharf skyscrapers dominating the immediate skyline — offers pause for thought. “We are literally standing here on the divide between rich and poor London,” he says. Since The Standard launched the Dispossessed Fund 15 years ago, and despite the paper’s success in raising money and awareness, inequality seems to have got worse. As we can see standing here right now, surplus food is being brought in by The Felix Project and local volunteers are helping to prepare it for local people who would otherwise be unable to afford to eat. And then right there on the other side of Poplar station is the wealth of Canary Wharf. It’s a sad story and it makes the work of Sister Christine and Felix — and indeed of our campaigns — all the more important.”
The star of Lord of the Rings, famous for his depiction of Gandalf, added that our campaign's support of refugees was particularly timely. "The number of people having to leave their homes because of natural disasters or cruel governments or cruel policies against individuals is huge,” said Sir Ian. “We should all bear in mind — what would it be like if we were in that situation? What would we feel if we risked our lives travelling across the world, only to land somewhere and be made to feel unwelcome? The natural human response to someone in that situation is not to say 'go away, you're not my problem', but rather, 'how can I help?'"
That’s certainly the spirit of NiP, which supports around 600 people a year and has provided over 60,000 meals in the last five years, aided by weekly deliveries of fresh produce from The Felix Project. For Sir Ian, it’s the combination of Felix and organisations like NiP working in tandem that is especially impressive. "When individuals respond to needs of people in their area and are helped by a larger organisation operating at scale, that’s a formula for success that can be replicated."
The Felix Project, which got off the ground in 2016 thanks in part to The Standard's 2016 Food for London campaign, is now the largest surplus food redistribution charity in the capital, distributing 42 million meals a year.
Charlotte Hill, CEO of The Felix Project says: "Around 39 per cent of working parents struggled to afford to feed their children in the last year. The Felix Project wants to be there — but we need support — and that is why we are so thankful to The Standard and Comic Relief for their winter appeal."
Felix are certainly there for Neighbours in Poplar, delivering 120kg of food a week to their base in St. Matthias Community Centre, a former church with stained-glass windows and high wooden pillars — built in 1654 by the East India Company. Christine, aged 88 but still full of beans, says: “What makes our charity different is the special relationship between the food deliverer and receiver. We call our deliverers ‘Deliveroo angels’. One woman we support told me: ‘When I hear that knock on the door, I know somebody cares’.”
Of Sir Ian, Christine says: “The people here love him. The first time he came down, they couldn’t believe Gandalf was here. He’s come many times since.” As for The Felix Project, she adds, “their produce saves us thousands and allows us to run a foodbank every Thursday and deliver a hot roast with dessert every Sunday.”
“Without this place, I would be screwed. I would literally be starving”
In happier times, Phil recalls how he used to drink in Evgeny’s and Sir Ian’s pub. “They were very nice to my dog,” he muses. “Ours is a very dog friendly pub,” agrees Sir Ian.
Phil describes how for over a decade he held down well-paid, responsible jobs, but his marriage and then his career collapsed due to anxiety and severe depression. “I was quite good at coping and suppressing, but you can only do so for so long before everything falls over,” he says. “I can get very, very depressed and struggle to get out of bed, and my behaviour can become quite erratic. Luckily my ex-wife is still my best friend and I am very close to my two children, who I see all the time. But I am difficult to live with,” he laughs ruefully, “so it’s best I am on my own.”
Today, Phil gets Universal Credit of £1,383, he says, of which £1,200 goes on rent and £145 on credit cards and utilities, leaving £10 a week for groceries. “I went from splurging £10,000 on family holidays to living on just over £1 a day.”
How does he manage? “I have learned to live very cheaply,” he says. “You can buy a pizza from Iceland for £1. And I come here and frequent other foodbanks as well. If you should end up like me” — he stretches out his arms — “at places like this, believe me, they’re a godsend. Without this place, I would be screwed. I would literally be starving.”
