OUR NEWS
The latest from Good Neighbours in North Cardiff
March 2024 My Community, Your Community, Our Community
Great News to all in North Cardiff – our charity Good Neighbours in North Cardiff (GNINC) has been awarded a significant grant to develop our services and expand into Rhiwbina. The Volunteering Wales grant funded by Welsh Government and administered by WCVA is specifically designed to support charities like ours who rely on volunteers to deliver a service which supports people to remain in their own home for as long as possible.
This grant will allow us to recruit more volunteers and to take on new requests for service from people who live in Rhiwbina. It will also help us modernise how we engage with volunteers and provide training and support to them.
The project encompassed four key areas:-
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Improvements to our business systems to help make us more efficient and effective.
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Brand Refresh including updating our website, promotional material and new signage to improve our English and Welsh communication in our community and add to the cultural vibrancy of Wales.
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Introduction late summer of Volunteer Management System to improve how volunteers can select tasks and professionals can make referrals.
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Expansion of service to encompass Rhiwbina late summer 2024.
This means we will be recruiting a new team member - a Community Volunteer Engagement Officer who will help spread the word of our charity’s work and recruit new volunteers and clients. We will be providing training opportunities for all our volunteers and developing a Recognition Scheme to thank our volunteers for their services. In 2023 we accomplished 1,984 tasks so nearly 4,000 hours of voluntary service were provided in North Cardiff which is amazing.
March 2014 Big Thank you to Rhydepennau Hub
Another Eggstraordinary event GNINC Volunteer Linda O’Reilly and friends ran an Easter Craft Fayre Saturday 23rd March at the Hub and raised an astounding £159 for Good Neighbours - what a fantastic effort.
March 2024 Tesco Eggstravaganza for Good Neighbours
Tesco store on Western Avenue has come up with a fantastic surprise for the Good Neighbours in North Cardiff charity. A donation of twenty Easter eggs were picked up to deliver to our most vulnerable clients before Easter. Volunteers Suzanne Taylor and Mike Jermyn were on hand to collect the eggs ready for other Good Neighbour Volunteers to deliver.
Kate and Clare Community Champions at the store were delighted to support the charity and its work they said “We’ve established a great link with the charity and to make this donation knowing its going to put a smile on their clients faces, as who doesn’t love chocolate!”
Chair of the charity Rosemary Mathews said “This generous donation is “eggactly” what makes Tesco’s such a fantastic supporter of our charity. In 2023 we accomplished 1984 tasks so nearly 4000 hours of voluntary service were provided in North Cardiff which is amazing. Our community work is all about making a difference and this coming weekend we will be seeing some very happy people!”
December 2023 TESCO Champions Christmas Gifts
Tesco Store Charity team on Western Avenue and their customers have kindly donated 18 presents for distribution to some of our clients who will be alone this Christmas. Kate and Clare will be out with our volunteers on Wednesday 13 December delivering the presents. We have formulated a close working relationship with these Tesco Champions and they have supported our Spring Musical Event and our late Summer Tea Party.
December 2023 We kick started our festive season with an evening of song
GNiNC held its first ever Christmas Charity Concert at Llanishen Rugby Club on Ty Glas Avenue on Wednesday 6 December.
We were meant to be at the Discovery pub but that became unavailable very short notice. We are very grateful to Llanishen Rugby Club who made their premises available so that the event could carry on and the Rugby staff were very helpful throughout the evening.
What a fantastic response we had from our supporters, two individual donors Adele Williams and Trevor Gibbons on hearing we were in need of funds to put on a buffet for our guests, generously gave us £500. Alison Gibbons sponsored the postage costs to all our clients telling them about the concert. We are truly blessed by all the help offered to deal with the change of venue.
The Ukulele Wolves started our programme with a round of well-known Christmas songs, followed by Oriana Choir who brought a really beautiful rendering of carols and a great alternative 12 days of Christmas …Turkey very funny poem! Finally the Choir for Good brought an upbeat rocking finish to the Concert and everyone left with beaming smiles. Even more spectacular is that the Concert raised just over £1100. It has been a great start to our Christmas season, and so much so, we will probably organise another Concert next Christmas.
November 2023 Trustee of the Year
Cardiff Third Sector Council organised the Cardiff Volunteer Awards in November and we are delighted to tell you that our former Treasurer Alison Gibbons won Trustee of the Year 2023. She was amongst 8 people nominated for this award but the judges selected her to win.
Alison has been a member of the Good Neighbours in North Cardiff for over 20 years. She initially volunteered, having moved from Bristol to Cardiff, as she wished to support someone locally in Cardiff as she hoped someone in Bristol would be doing the same for her own mother. As the millennium approached, Alison and her husband joined the trustees of the charity and they both became engaged in taking the charity forward into the new century. Alison, a professional Building Surveyor, brought her own unique sense of order and construct to the charity. Quite quickly she took on the role of Treasurer and the charity had just then appointed a new co-ordinator and they spent the next 23 years working together. Whilst other honorary officers came and went, Alison and the co-ordinator worked together in successfully managing the charity and its activities.
It may seem that there are many other trustees around with long service, but Alison goes above and beyond. If the coordinator is absent, she can step into the breach and deliver that role. If one of the telephone administrators is poorly, Alison is the first person to volunteer to cover the phones. If a volunteer can’t do their normal task such as weekly shopping, then the telephone administrators know they can call Alison, and she’ll gladly offer to pick up that task. Alison’s home is Good Neighbour’s stock room with all the paraphernalia for events - raffle tickets and prizes, concerts - banners and bunting, Tea party - table cloths and trays. At these activities Alison is always first to volunteer to sell tickets, collect money and generally persuade people to supporting our endeavours.
If you were setting up a charity from scratch and someone asked what makes a good trustee, we would say Alison epitomises all that makes the voluntary sector such a truly good place to be involved in. She has a clear focus on the work we do, she can help prioritise our decision making, and she knows how to engage and get the best out of other trustees and volunteers.
We send Alison our congratulations and our thanks for the many years of service she has given to our charity and our clients.
October 2023: We've been busy
At our AGM this year, a question was raised about the number of tasks we carry out. Below is a table which shows the number of tasks carried out each month from April to August in 2023. In that period, Good Neighbours in North Cardiff performed a total of 805 tasks which helped nearly 100 people in North Cardiff who would otherwise have struggled to maintain their independent living situation. (We do have a number of regular clients who had multiple tasks done for them).
That we could achieve this is due to our amazing group of volunteers. Thank you to them for their tremendous generosity in giving their time.
March 2023 Goodbye - and Hello!
After many years of dedication to Good Neighbours in North Cardiff, our Co-ordinator Duncan Pugh is leaving. The Trustees would like to express their appreciation for Duncan’s long and committed service, and wish him well in his “retirement”.
We welcome Julie Cull to our charity as the new Operations Co-ordinator, and are sure that she will soon settle in. We hope that she will enjoy working with us in serving our community.
December 2022: Two of our volunteers have been recognised for their community service over many years, both to ourselves and other organisations. Our thanks and congratulations go to both of them
Alison Gibbons - nominated for Trustee of the Tear Award Our congratulations go to our very own Treasurer, Alison Gibbons, who was nominated for the Trustee of the Year Award. Alison has been our Treasurer for the past 20 years and certainly deserves a medal!
Alison commented – “It was quite a surprise when Sue (a Trustee) asked if she could nominate me as Trustee of the Year for the Cardiff Volunteer Awards, and at first I was reluctant to agree. Then I realised that it could be an opportunity to raise the Good Neighbours’ profile to a wider audience, so I gave in! It was even more of a surprise when I was selected as one of the three finalists. At the awards ceremony, I was able to give a short interview to one of the sponsor organisations, to be used in any future publicity, and met volunteers from other groups in Cardiff. Although I was the only finalist in my category to attend the ceremony, I did not win the award, but was delighted when Roger won in his category. The event was very relaxed and the number of organisations represented showed how valuable volunteer work is in the community”.
Roger Marshall - Volunteer Coordinator of the Year
Congratulations also to Roger Marshall, a Community First Responder (CFR), who has been presented with the Volunteer Coordinator of the Year Award for 2022 by Cardiff Third Sector Council. Roger worked as a pharmacologist for almost 40 years and joined the Welsh Ambulance Service seven years ago. Alongside volunteering as a CFR, Roger has recently visited schools as part of the Trust’s Shoctober campaign designed to educate children about the importance of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) when someone is in cardiac arrest. He also still lectures a couple of times a year for the University of Cardiff’s College of Medicine on the accident and emergency course and to the dental students. The Volunteer Coordinator of the Year Award is presented to an individual who goes above and beyond, supporting others to volunteer. Oh yes - and he still finds time to support GNiNC
