{"id":539195,"date":"2026-06-17T03:49:20","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T03:49:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/539195\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T03:49:20","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T03:49:20","slug":"gary-has-never-forgotten-where-he-comes-from","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/539195\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Gary has never forgotten where he comes from\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Snow Patrol\u2019s Gary Lightbody has donated \u00a310,000 to a charity in west Belfast<\/a> after one of its toughest mornings following the week of race\u2011hate riots in the city.<\/p>\n

Foodstock<\/a> founder Paul Doherty thanked the Bangor<\/a> musician and everyone at The Lightbody Foundation for supporting the charity\u2019s work across Belfast.<\/a><\/p>\n

Foodstock began as a grassroots response to food poverty and has grown into a broad community support network offering food, education, employment help, school uniforms, health and wellbeing programmes, and practical assistance for individuals and families.<\/p>\n

Independent cllr for west Belfast Paul Doherty told The Irish News<\/a> the call could not have come at a better time. <\/p>\n

\"‘Gary<\/a>\"Live:<\/a><\/p>\n

He said: \u201cIt lifted the morale of a lot of volunteers. To be honest, he rang when it was absolutely manic in here, it was a really tough Monday morning, so it was great. <\/p>\n

\u201cWith everything that was happening last week, we were getting ready to roll out 4,000 breakfasts to the community. We were really in the thick of it when we got the call.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"PaulPaul Doherty from Foodstock in West Belfast. PICTURE COLM LENAGHAN <\/p>\n

He continued: \u201cThis has been one of the toughest weeks we have experienced at Foodstock for some time, but this news has given our entire team a massive lift.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the last week especially, our volunteers have been getting directly into communities to support people who were fearful of leaving their homes because of racial violence<\/a>, as well as families who had been displaced and urgently needed food, reassurance and practical help.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey stepped forward at an incredibly difficult time, delivering food, checking on vulnerable people and making sure those affected knew they were not alone.<\/p>\n

\u201cDemand for support remains extremely high, and our volunteers and staff are working every day to ensure that people facing hardship are not left behind.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cGary has never forgotten where he comes from, and this generosity demonstrates a genuine commitment to giving back and supporting communities across Belfast.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Snow Patrol\u2019s Gary Lightbody has donated \u00a310,000 to a charity in west Belfast after one of its toughest…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539196,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[75],"tags":[663,3121,18,117,19,17,1432],"class_list":["post-539195","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-belfast","tag-charity","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-west"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116763412379348461","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=539195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}