A group of Waveney carers are uniting to give dozens of vulnerable people a homecooked meal this Christmas.

Hayley-Anna Hipkiss and several of her colleagues at Beccles-based home care service Caring Forever will be tirelessly cooking and delivering the meals to patients they see daily, sparing them from a microwaved dinner on Christmas Day.

She said: "It's quite sad seeing so many people on their own, especially at Christmas time.

"For some people, the half an hour they get with a carer will be the only interaction they get with someone.

"Most of my colleagues have large families, and I have four children myself, and I can't sit here knowing a lot of the people we support are on their own, especially after such a bad couple of years.

"I want to do something to try and make their day that little bit better."

Miss Hipkiss will welcome colleagues to her Lowestoft home to cook dozens of Christmas dinners, with more volunteers on hand to deliver them to service users around Waveney.

She said: "One lady used to cook Christmas dinner every year for her whole family, and she's a bit gutted she can't do that anymore, so we wanted to do what we can to help.

"We are organising a Christmas meal for the clients we see daily.

"Quite a lot of them are single and living alone with not much family around.

"Through chatting with them we realised a lot of them usually just have a microwave dinner on Christmas Day.

"There's about eight of us who are going to get together and cook a homemade dinner for them at my house, and we have more people involved who are going to go around a deliver them all.

"We have designed a menu and started taking orders."

The group are funding the dinners themselves, although are welcoming donations from local businesses and supermarkets.

Miss Hipkiss said: "We are doing this on our own and funding it ourselves - and carers aren't paid a massive amount.

"My partner's business has donated a turkey, and if any local businesses want to get involved too they can."

Anyone looking to support the group's efforts can email Miss Hipkiss at hipkiss.ha1993@gmail.com.