A SCHEME which provides help to people with dementia has received a £6,200 boost.

Monmouth Town Council (MTC) has agreed to help fund well being and cultural activities at Monmouth Museum.

Following a plea by Ms Rachael Rogers, from the Monmouthshire County Council Tourism and Museum Service, councillors agreed to use earmarked funds to help promote the memories pop-up café and provide funding for exhibitions within the museum.

The memories cafés have been pilot studies organised by pupils from Monmouth Comprehensive School and have been running for 12 months, proving successful in providing somewhere for an audience which may be suffering from dementia; the museum has gained dementia-friendly status because of the cafés.

Ms Rogers told MTC that support funding of £6,200 would allow the memories cafés to run on a monthly basis for the next two years and continue to provide for groups of the younger and older generations and extend the meetings into community venues around the town. This would require ‘rempods’, pop up reminiscence rooms from vintage shops to old-fashioned pubs. These dementia ’pods’ reassure patients in care homes and hospitals and have now got backing from the Dragon’s Den.

It is hoped after the two years, the cafés will become self sufficient, having their own pot of money to keep them going.

The request for funding for exhibitions in the museum was also put forward to councillors. The museum has two areas - the ground floor and the mezzanine - where exhibitions such as the recent Rockfield Studios display will attract extra footfall.

The exhibitions are either from the museum’s own collection or borrowed. The next one planned is on local artist the late Otto Macaig, who taught art at the boys school and who also served in the Polish horse brigades of the Second World War.

£3,500 was requested – £2,000 for the ground floor and £1,500 for the mezzanine – and this would allow the museum to purchase interpretation panels, stands, publicity and help with the cost of transport.

The museum has already extended its opening hours and is now open on a Sunday between 11am and 4pm, which has proved “highly successful”, and are open throughout lunchtime during the weekdays, closing at 4pm.

The proposal to fully fund the request was passed unanimously.