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Charity and Voluntary Sector
BIG: Veterans across the nation are set for trips to Normandy and theatres of war throughout the world to commemorate the battles that led to the end of WW2. A total of 457 awards (worth over £931,000) have been made from BIG’s Heroes Return 2 programme, funding 1,572 WWII veterans, widows, spouses and carers to mark overseas anniversaries throughout 2009 and 2010.
Launched to mark the historic 60th anniversary of D-DAY in 2004, BIG’s first Heroes Return scheme awarded £16.6m to over 39,000 veterans, spouses, widows & carers to fund commemorative visits to Second World War battlefields, cemeteries and other significant places across the world.
Heroes Return was the centrepiece of the Veterans Reunited programme, including Home Front Recall which awarded £19.2 million to support UK-based group events & activities to commemorate those who contributed to the war-effort on the home front. The programme also includes Their Past Your Future, a schools & education programme to give young people the opportunity to learn first-hand from veterans about their experience of war.
Press release ~ BIG’s Heroes Return 2 programme ~ Veterans Reunited programme ~ Home Front Recall ~ Their Past Your Future
Cabinet Office: Baroness Julia Neuberger, the Government’s independent Volunteering Champion, has called for all civil servants to be given up to 5 days off per year to volunteer. The report explores the difference between private sector & public sector attitudes to volunteering and it finds that outside the civil service (in 2007) 36% of employees had an employer-supported volunteering scheme available to them. Approximately 70% of FTSE 100 companies have some kind of employer supported volunteering programme.
In the report Baroness Neuberger sets out the business case under three main headings:
1. Outreach & community engagement enables government to be more responsive
2. Volunteering is in itself a way of enabling practical learning & development
3. It boosts staff morale & builds teams
Press release ~ Employer-supported volunteering in the civil service ~ Office of the Third Sector (OTS) ~ National Council of Voluntary Organisations ~ Volunteering Wales website ~ WAG - Voluntary Sector ~ Wales Council for Voluntary Action ~ How to Volunteer ~ VSO – Volunteering for Education ~ Volunteering England ~ TimeBank UK ~ Volunteer Network Centre Scotland
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