Anzac Day breakfast saved

The Feilding RSA’S Anzac Day commemorations have been saved after the closure of its base put securing a venue for the important day in doubt.

The Rangitikei Club, which previously occupied the bottom floor of the Bowen St convention centre, had hosted the RSA for many years but shut its doors for the final time on Friday.

The closure left the RSA searching for a new home where members could gather every Friday at 6pm for their Ode of Remembrance, and for events like their popular Anzac Day breakfast.

Feilding RSA president Barrie Law said they were relieved to have ‘a number of offers’ on the table for a new home. Although it was unlikely the club would be moving in before Anzac Day, Law said preparations were otherwise uninterrupted as the owner of the old Rangitikei Club had allowed them to use the facility’s upper floor for the breakfast.

‘‘The offer to use the upper floor of the convention centre has come as a godsend for us and allows us to operate as usual again now. We didn’t have a location for the breakfast prior to that offer.’’

Law could not disclose who they were talking to about their new long-term base, but said the committee would meet up following Anzac Day to discuss the options.

In the meantime, Law said Feilding RSA members would gather at the cenotaph on Fridays.

The Ode is regularly recited at memorial services commemorating World War I, such as Anzac Day. In New Zealand most RSAS read it at 6pm, followed by a minute’s silence and the Last Post.

‘‘Life goes on for us,’’ Law said. ‘‘Our normal process is Poppy Day and then Anzac Day and that will resume as usual.

‘‘Once all that madness dies down we’ll address the answer to a new home. As it rests we’ve had a number of options come to us.’’

Manawatu mayor Helen Worboys said the RSA was an ‘‘integral’’ part of the Feilding community. She said its work educating the community and visiting schools around Anzac time was invaluable.

‘‘Nationally there’s a renewed interest in Anzac Day and let’s hope with that a renewed interest in RSAS,’’ she said.

‘‘It’s unfortunate what has happened with the Rangitikei Club, but now there’s a chance for our community to step up and say ‘we believe in what the RSA does and what it stands for’.’’

Worboys said she wanted to help the RSA find funding for a new flagpole. She also said a wall of remembrance would be erected this year where the community could make poppies with the names of people they wished to remember and put them on the wall.

Law said RSA members would form up outside the Bowen St complex and march to the Anzac Day dawn parade in Feilding’s town centre as they had in the past.

Members and veterans will also be out on the streets of Feilding on April 21 for their annual Poppy Day collection.