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GLUG Charity 2009
Posted by chrislee on October 14th, 2008
Dear All
With our AGM fast approaching, one of the items normally agreed at the meeting is our nominated charity for the year.
I would like to open the decision to all, giving those who cannot attend the AGM the ability to put their ideas forward.
If you could leave a comment to this post giving your choice of charity for the club to support in 2009, in November we shall pick the three most common for everyone to vote upon before the AGM.
Many thanks
Chris
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Personally, I think that The Food Chain, which has been our charity for several years, is an excellent cause. However, I do appreciate that it’s a London-based charity, while we are a national club. It still gets my vote, though.
Neil.
Reply to NeilCancer research
Caroline
Reply to CarolineI have no preference at all, as long as we support a good cause. Maybe something less well-known and could do with a bit more donation than the big names.
Reply to LianI agree that the Food Chain is a good cause, but its a very different and much larger charity than it used to be and becuase of hte demographics of HIV is no longer directly an LGBT charity. I’d be in favour of changing our donation to something directly LGBT or conservation-related. My suggestion for LGBT is the Albert Kennedy Trust, which works with young homeless LGTB people. It’s under financial pressure but helps our young peopel at a very vulnerable point in their lives/ It now only works in London and Manchester, but my guess is that a lot of young homeless LGBT people end up in those two cities so I am sure it has a UK-wide reach. Its website is http://www.akt.org.uk/.
If we want to go conservation, how about something like the Shark Trust http://www.sharktrust.org/? Or I’ve jsut seen something called Campaign Whale http://www.campaign-whale.org/, which does what it says on the tin. Or, if we want to back effective campaigning, how about Greenpeace?
Chris/Neil, could we have an on-line voting button thingy to encourage members to vote?
Reply to debbiepI agree with Debbie. I would rather see our charity funding going towards an organisation that works directly with the LGBT community or in the field of marine conservation.
Given that, as divers, we often travel to countries in which the LGBT community is persecuted, I think that support for the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission might be appropriate.
But Debbie’s point that the Albert Kennedy Trust is under financial pressure is a very good one. The support that we can afford to give would probably not make a great deal of difference to a large, international organisation like IGLHRC (I believe that a similar point was made about the Royal National Lifeboat Institution at the last AGM when it was said that, whilst being deserving, they had a substantial surplus of funds).
As far as small, UK-based charities working with the LGBT community goes, I can’t think of a better one than Albert Kennedy Trust.
As for marine conservation charities, I would favour the Marine Conservation Society, who do very important work lobbying for sustainable fishing legislation and protection of sensitive marine areas. They are working hard to get a Marine Bill passed and also ran the Marine Reserves Now campaign.
Reply to JasonI also think that any contributions that we could make to Greenpeace or Sea Shepherd might make make a real difference in the short term.
I agree with both Debbie and Jason. Any organisation which contributes to conservation of marine environment deserves our support.
Reply to AnnaSonja and I have been raising money for a charity called the Animals Asia Foundation for a couple of years. The website is http://www.animalsasia.org
Whilst not being related to diving or gay issues, it’s a really ace charity. Money raised helps to rescue bears from atrocious conditions in bile farms across Asia and re-house them in rehabilitation parks. They also help to protect cats and dogs from cruelty too.
So we would like to propose this charity.
Reply to fiona whiteI agree with Debbie’s proposal. Time to move onto another charity perhaps, to be fair? If we want to continue to support an HIV related charity, GMFA is probably more focussed on the LGBT community than Food Chain. Though they probably have enough money anyway, so AKT probably can do with more support.
Can we support 2 different charities, one for LGBT welfare and one for marine conservation?
Ben K
Reply to BenIt seems that the obvious one that most of us may like to support is well known Marine Conservation Society. However, there are many smaller, and may be more needy ones, as Wales and Dolphins Conservation Society, National Seal Sanctuary, Marine Connection, Sea Watch Foundation, The Marine Mammals Centre, and, a very close to home one: British Divers Marine Life Rescue. It will be difficult to chose from the long list.
Reply to AnnaHi Neil,
Reply to JasonGiven the large number of proposals, would it not be possible to have a system of voting whereby people can choose their top two or three choices, like we did to decide the picnic location last year?
Jason
Yes indeed. I’ll set up the Poll so that people can choose up to 3.
Reply to NeilFantastic! Thanks, Neil.
Reply to JasonGiven that there are so many charities to choose from, I’ve set the poll to allow members to choose up to 4 charities. However, all choices have equal weight.
Reply to Neil