'Pretty devastating': Sydney councillor delivers food in lockdown districts

FILE PHOTO: Bilal El-Hayek, a local government councillor and community leader, volunteers with Meals on Wheels to deliver food to members of vulnerable communities during a lockdown to curb the spread of a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak in the Canterbury-Bankstown local government area of southwest Sydney, Australia, August 4, 2021. REUTERS/Loren Elliott/File Photo

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Bilal El-Hayek and friend and volunteer Amer Yassine carry boxes of packaged meals onto the front porch of Darlene, a single mother of seven including three she is fostering.

From a distance, El-Hayek, a councillor for the city of Canterbury Bankstown in Sydney's southwest, exchanges a few words with Darlene to check on how she is coping under lockdown.