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If part of your New Year resolutions are to get fit or support a charity, Home-Start may have the answer!
Issued: 12th January 2012
With five places already gone, Home-Start Bridgend only has seven places left in the 2012 London Marathon. Anyone interested in taking part should get in contact by the end of January.
The charity is one of 327 local Home-Starts that are spread right across the UK and forms part of the UK’s leading family support charity.
Home-Start recruits and trains parent volunteers to support families who are struggling to cope. This can be for any reason including domestic abuse, multiple births, isolation, depression, bereavement and mental health.
Lynne Thomas, manager at Home-Start Bridgend said: “At a time when funding is so uncertain for many charities across the country, to have the chance to fundraise through the London Marathon and raise vital funds is a fantastic opportunity. With a closing date of the first week of February for registrations, we are giving it one last push and imploring people who would like to do something for charity to get in touch.”
Keith Ellingham who has previously run the London Marathon for Home-Start Bridgend said: “I have first hand experience of the difference Home-Start makes to the lives of families, as I used to have a Home-Start volunteer myself. I know as a charity they rely heavily on fundraising activities, and I just wanted to find a way of saying thank you to them for all of the support they gave me. What better way of giving something back than to run the London marathon for them.”
Home-Start Bridgend is currently waiting to hear about their funding for the next financial year, and is taking things one day at a time. But, says Lynne, this can make it very difficult to plan ahead, and recruit and train new volunteers - at a time when the demand for the Home-Start service across the country is at an all time high.
This did not stop the local charity from offering each and every one of its supported families a £25 voucher at Christmas, just to make life that little bit easier for them.
One family supported by a Home-Start volunteer said: “If it were not for Home-Start, I wouldn’t be here anymore, and my children would be in care.”
To find out more about Home-Start Bridgend, or if you interested in running the London Marathon on their behalf, please contact 01656 668111 or homestartbridge@btconnect.com.
If you would like to run the London Marathon and split your fundraising donations with Home-Start Bridgend and Home-Start UK, (the national charity that oversees the running of all 327 local Home-Starts), please contact Nicola Clark, Challenge and Supporter Relations Manager, Home-Start UK. Tel: 0116 2587925, E: nclark@home-start.org.uk
-ENDS-
Notes to Editor
Home-Start is the UK’s leading family support charity. We recruit and train volunteers to support parents, in their own homes, with at least one child under the age of five. Our home visiting work is unique in the UK. The charity was set up in 1973 and now has 327 Home-Starts supporting nearly 36,000 families and almost 77,000 children each year. Almost 17,000 volunteers visit families in their own homes – parents supporting other parents in a variety of situations including isolation, bereavement, multiple births, illness or disability.
In Wales last year, over 700 Home-Start volunteers supported almost 2,000 families and over 3,000 children.
Contact details:
Lynne Thomas, manager, Home-Start Bridgend
Tel: 01656 668111
Email: home-startbridge@btconnect.com
For information on more of our challenge events click here
