On Friday, 4th July 2025, our charity held a special Annual Meeting, marking forty years since the Rainbow Centre was founded. Key figures from the organisation’s history shared their reflections on the charity’s past, while inspiring talks from Emeritus Professor Peter Taylor-Gooby (OBE), the food bank charity Trussell, and Kent-wide homeless charity Porchlight brought the audience up to date on key issues.
The audience at the well-attended event, at the Harbour Church on Canterbury Road in Folkestone, was made up of council officials, former employees and volunteers and Rainbow Centre supporters.
Highlighting the growing disparity in incomes and the increasing costs of housing, Professor Peter Taylor-Gooby shared insightful solutions to minimise the impact of growing inequality on the local community. Tom Neumark, CEO of Porchlight, emphasised the challenges facing charities as funding is squeezed.
Speaking after the event, Ellie Wormald, Area Manager for South East London and Kent at Trussell said: “While this is a wonderful opportunity to celebrate the impact that the Rainbow Centre and Shepway Foodbank has had over the last forty years, it’s a key moment for us to be asking about the future. Emergency food support is a lifeline but not the solution to the spiralling poverty we know exists in our communities. There is a clear way forward, and we know that a future without the need for food banks is possible.”
A lively plenary followed, with many questions from the audience.
After refreshments and networking, it was an honour to be joined by Canon Peter MacKenzie, formerly the vicar of St Saviour’s Church, which is now Harbour Church, and to hear warm messages of support from co-founder Reverend Tom Bowman, and previous CEOs and managers. Recalling the early days of the charity, when counselling and contact for estranged families was offered from a caretaker’s house that belonged to Mundella Primary School, Canon Mackenzie noted the word ‘care’ fits the ethos of the charity, then known as The Family Care Centre.
A Christian ecumenical project largely organised by Folkestone Churches Together, the charity was founded on the principles of ‘ordinary people helping ordinary people’.
That fundamental principle remains today, with up to one hundred and fifty volunteers running the charity’s services across the district of Folkestone and Hythe, supported by a staff of eleven.
All the services operated by the Rainbow Centre received awards. These include Homeless Support, Shepway Foodbank and Pantries, FoodStop, Money First Aid, and the earliest service, now called the Family Contact Centre.
Closing, Peter Le Feuvre, Chair of Trustees, shared Rainbow Centre’s plans to expand the Homeless Support Service with supported accommodation in the centre of Folkestone, not currently provided by any other charity. He indicated that there was a significant shortage of housing for people experiencing homelessness, and that the charity was now in a strong position to begin to provide such accommodation within the town.
Download a copy of the press release here.
