Volunteer saluted at Age UK awards
LOCAL older peoples charity Age UK Lancashire has held its annual staff and volunteer awards – with one Ormskirk volunteer rewarded for excellence.
This year’s event had a festive theme and was held at the town hall in Chorley on Tuesday, December 18.
Bringing together staff, volunteers and trustees the celebrations included live musical entertainment from a Southport barbershop singing group called the Men in Black, who treated the audience to a variety of songs from the ages, plus some Christmas classics.
David Ward from Age UK Lancashire said: “This is the fifth event we have done to celebrate our organisations achievements and in what has been quite a challenging year in a number of ways, it has been great to be able to finish on a real high”.
The event was attended by many of the new trustees the charity has brought in and was an opportunity for new chief executive Teri Stephenson to review the year and talk about the future plans and opportunities she hopes to oversee.
Mr Ward added: “We were pleased that so many of our team from around the county were able to attend.
“The real highlight of the day was celebrating the staff and volunteer nominees and winners.
“It was great to have the staff awards sponsored by Vincent’s Solicitors and Napthen’s Solicitors sponsoring our volunteer awards.
“We really appreciate their support, without which we wouldn’t be able to host these events.”
Ormskirk and West Lancashire was represented on the day by David Ashton, who picked up a volunteer award for his excellent contribution to the Wellbeing Centre on Moorgate in Ormskirk.
David volunteers there every week, helping people with blue badge applications and any other support people at the centre need.
He has also trained fellow volunteers in other parts of the county to do blue badge application, enabling more older people to benefit from the service.
Age UK Lancashire plays an important role for older people in the county through campaigning for change to social care, and providing advice and support for people in a variety of areas, including welfare benefit checks and information on how to stay healthy and warm in winter.
Lancashire also has one of the highest rates on loneliness in the whole county with more than 35,000 people over 65 said to be chronically lonely.
Age UK Lancashire works to support people to stay active and socialise by providing activity groups and opportunities for people to remain independent.
Claire Hamilton from Vincent’s solicitors said: “It was a real tear jerker watching the films and hearing stories about the people they support.
“We were delighted to be able to sponsor the staff awards and felt privileged to be involved.”
Information on supporting the charity or the services they provide can be found on www.ageuklancs. org.uk – or by calling 0300 303 1234.