News

With Life for a Life’s new funding application system nearing the end of it’s first full year in operation, we have received many applications from new health related organisations, however ‘Life for a Life’ was pleased to receive an application from a beneficiary we have supported for many years; Bolton Hospice. The hospice has been undertaking a major expansion and refurbishment project which is due to run into the 2014 and has seen the addition of new rooms and facilities for patients. As part of this work the Hospice will be adding some helpful new technology to bring bed rooms up-to-date with the introduction of ‘Smart TV’s’, which will enable inpatients to access the web, social media and Skype from the comfort of their bed. This technology will help patients to stay in touch with loved ones, family and friends and ‘Life for a Life’ takes great pleasure in announcing that we will be donating £1699 to fund the purchase of 7 Smart TV’s which will be installed in the new year.

We would like to thank Bolton Hospice for their continued commitment to patient wellbeing and allowing us to help support them.

It is also important to thank all those who support ‘Life for a Life’, whether that be through purchasing a memorial tree or a land owner who donates land which we can plant on, and in the case of the Bolton area the land at Marklands Reservoir was kindly donated by United Utilities and has help to raise £35,800 for Bolton Hospice. Without all your support our work would not be possible, so thank you!

On the 3rd December 2013 Bury Hospice was presented with a cheque for £6,000 by The Worshipful the Mayor of the Bury Metropolitan Borough Councillor Sharon Briggs and Elizabeth Matthew of Dunsters Farm Ltd on behalf of ‘Life for a Life’ Memorial Forests. We were joined by Lt Col. Pat Cooke of 207 (Manchester) Field Hospital and Maj Eddy Hardaker, Trustee of Life for a Life.

The £6,000 was raised through the sale of memorial trees at the Dunsters Farm memorial forest in Holcombe Brook, on land which was kindly donated by Dunsters Farm Ltd and the Radcliffe family.

Since its opening the site has generated £13,000 which has gone directly to Bury Hospice. This donation is in support of the hospices capital appeal which has funded the building of the new Bury Hospice on Rochdale Old Road. ‘Life for a Life’ has operated memorial woodlands in the Bury area for the last 10 years, on land donated by Bury Council, United Utilities and Dunsters Farm Ltd, and we are now pleased to say that we have donated £21,900 to Bury Hospice over that time.

During the National Tree Week (23rd Nov- 1st Dec) celebrations, school children from Bury and Royton, Oldham converged on the ‘Life for a Life’ Memorial Forests, Fusiliers Meadow in Whitefield to engage in the planting of a new hedge and fruit orchard as part of the ‘Friends of the Forest’ Scheme for Schools. ‘Life for a Life’ supports local charities across North West and further afield through the creation of beautiful forests, However it has never been our aim to create closed woodlands that the public can’t use; so in partnership with Fusiliers Museum in Bury we gave children a chance to engage with nature and create a new home where it can thrive in the borough.

The Children didn’t only plant trees but also built ‘Bug Hotels’ which were positioned in the wildlife area of the meadow, encouraging wildlife to “move in” and hopefully help to bring more flora and fauna to the area. The Fusiliers Museums ‘Pals Battalion’ enlisted the children in a re-enactment so that the children could learn about what life in the trenches of France during World War One might of been like. This was especially poignant given that the centenary of the ‘great war’ is just around the corner in 2014 and will be remembered in celebrations throughout the country.

The children also received a special ‘friends of forest’ study booklet which contained facts and information, as well as a packet of low flowering wild meadow flower seed so they can continue there nature adventure at home.

Following on from National Tree Week we are looking for schools or community who wouldlike to participate in sowing some wildflower and Poppy seeds in spring 2014, ready for the centenary of World War One in 2014, the aim is not only to enhance the beauty of the Meadow but will also be a respectful way to commemorate this important world event.

For further information regarding ‘Life for a Life’ Memorial Forests and our ‘Friends of the Forest’ Scheme please visit our website www.lifeforalife.org.uk and get in touch

On a sunny Sunday morning at the ‘Life for a Life’ Salmon Fields meadow memorial forest a tree and picnic bench were dedicated to a local Royton hero, who served with the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (R.E.M.E) on numerous tours.

Michael Pavitt or ‘Pav’ as he was known to his friends and family was affectionately remembered with a parade, whilst a lone piper and standard bearers from local associations in Oldham, presided over the tree and bench dedication, which had been paid for through kind donations by the local community.

‘Life for a Life’ on many occasions offer help to local communities who wish to do something special for heroes like ‘Pav’. However on this occasion the effort was not all ours.

We would like to thank all whom attended the tree and bench dedication and helped to raise the funds needed but we would also like to thank one of our long term partners, Oldham Council for allowing the use of a disused concrete base that has been on the site for some time.

‘Life for a Life‘ has carefully refurbished this base at no cost to the Council, allowing the new picnic bench to be securely fixed and replace a broken bench which once stood there.

Furthermore, we would also like to thank Chadderton Welding a local fabrication and welding company who very kindly fabricated and donated ‘free of charge‘ the 4 steel fastening cups which hold the bench in place.

We are pleased to announce that on the sunny morning of the 30th April 2013 Lady Elizabeth Gass JP., Her Majesty’s Lord Lieutenant of Somerset, Mr Colin Skellett OBE, Chief Executive of Wessex Water, The Worshipful The Mayor and Mayoress of Bridgwater, Councillor Gill Slocombe Chairman of Sedgemoor Council and Mr David Jenkins Vice Chairmen of St. Margaret’s Hospice officially opened our new Durleigh Meadows memorial forest in Bridgwater.

We are extremely thankful to Wessex Water for their continued support and for donating this lovely area to ‘Life for a Life’, which we have now refurbished in to a beautiful meadow complete with a Japanese style bridge. The site is home to an abundance of wildlife and 5 small habitat areas have been created to increase and enhance the area’s natural diversity.

This is our 7th Memorial Forest in the Southwest and one of our largest; it will have the capacity to plant a minimum of 400 trees.

To make this event even more special we donated £2000 to St. Margaret’s hospice. This donation will go towards the funding of a new Ultra Sound Scanner which will enable faster diagnosis and treatment for patients at the hospice.

This equipment is another step forward for St. Margaret’s and will aid the amazing work of the hospice in the southwest region. This donation brings the total donations to the hospice from ‘Life for a Life’ to £37,000. We have also pledged another £2,000 once the hospice has reached the half way point of their fundraising target.

The cheque was presented by Mr Colin Skellett OBE on behalf of Wessex Water and ‘Life for a Life’ to the vice chairman of St. Margaret’s hospice.

We would also like to thank the Sunflower Singers and the Students from Haygrove School in Bridgwater for the wonderful performances they gave during the day.

It is important to remember that all this would not be possible without the support of Wessex Water who have helped ‘Life for a life’ to continue to grow in the Somerset area throughout our 10 year mutually beneficial partnership.

‘Life for a Life’ is delighted to announce that we have donated a total of £4,000 to Bury Hospice in recent months. This money has gone specifically to the Building Fund for the new hospice, which will be officially opened in summer 2013. ‘Life for a Life’ will be donating a further £2,000 over the next few months. Following this there will be a cheque presentation with the new head of fundraising at the hospice, James Arthur.

This £6,000 donation is in memory of Les Ratcliffe MBE, the founder of Bury Hospice, who donated the land at Dunsters Farm Meadow to ‘Life for a Life’ for the planting of memorial trees. Dunsters Farm Meadow is a very popular site and is almost full with close to 200 memorial trees and several woodland benches.

The new hospice is located on Rochdale Old Road and houses 12 inpatient bedrooms, rooms for relatives to stay and provides day and outpatient services and therapies. There is also a large dining area, landscaped gardens, a small play area for children and a range of other facilities for patients and their families.

‘Life for a Life’ is committed to making regular donations to hospices, hospitals and other health related charities as well as donating money back into the local communities where memorial forests are located.

Our new donations process is now fully functioning. We regularly receive applications for funding which the Board of Trustees review every quarter to decide which applicants have been successful and how much will be donated.

Most recently ‘Life for a Life’ has donated £1,500 towards the reconstruction of the drive way leading to St Joseph’s Hospice in Thornton, Liverpool. There are a lot of bumps in the road making it uncomfortable for patients travelling by ambulance and so this work is essential.

St Gemma’s Hospice in Leeds recently submitted an application for funding towards their daily medical supplies such as syringes, dressings and special drains. To which we have donated £1,200 towards. Medical supplies such as this are vital to St Gemma’s Hospice and are used on a daily basis and so ‘Life for a Life’ was very pleased to make this donation.  https://www.facebook.com/st.g.hospice

‘Life for a Life’ has also donated £500 towards Bolton Hospice’s Arts Community Project. This project is aimed to stimulate patients attending the day therapy and also introduce aspects of hospice care to members of the community through engagement via creative projects such as painting, poetry and memory sharing. This creates a positive educational experience by allowing schoolchildren to work alongside day therapy patients.

If you would like any more information about donations made by ‘Life for a Life’ or if you would like to submit an application for funding please contact us on 0161 624 2299 or email info@lifeforalife.org.uk

Spring is in the air or at least it is nearly here in Oldham and with this in mind the’ Life for a Life’ grounds team has embarked on another year of maintenance at Dr Kershaw’s hospice in Oldham. Even though ‘Life for a Life’ has been taking care of the hospices  grounds and gardens for the last 10 years this year we have decided to take on the challenge of  reducing the height and pruning the large leylandii hedge which surrounds the grounds. With these works we aim to let more light on to rear garden and conservatories for the benefit of patients and visitors at the hospice.

Along with this ‘gift in kind’ to the hospice we have also been helping to train their volunteers in the safe and proper use of the garden machinery which we have donated to them over the last few months. This machinery has included a professional Honda pedestrian mower, Stihl garden strimmer and the partial funding of a small John Deere lawn tractor, so that the hospices volunteers can safely maintain the front lawns and beds. This will help to keep the Dr. Kershaw’s looking neat and tidy whilst ‘Life for a Life’ will continue to look after the larger rear garden and the ‘Life for a Life’ memorial forest.

‘Gift in Kind’ grounds work projects like this help to illustrate the wider benefits of ‘Life for a Life’ and whilst we will continue to give monetary donations to good causes like hospices and other health related organisation we will also, where we can, use our resources and knowledge to help with other projects for the benefit of local communities.