More 🌻 Seeds.

I haven’t just been involved with large charitable organisations, I have also helped set up several smaller groups who are no less important to the people they help.

Cluster headache is a rare a little understood neurological condition. GP’s and even most neurologists had little experience of it and there was no effective treatment. My wife is a sufferer. In 2001 along with a few other sufferers we set up and funded a charity -OUCH- the organisation for understanding cluster headaches. We started a newsletter; set up a help line; mailed information to 30,000 UK GP’s and organised a national conference. Since then treatment has improved and cluster headache is far better understood. OUCH played a key part in that and continues to be run today by volunteers 🌻

Another voluntary group I helped get started was Cheylesmore Good Neighbours in Coventry. I only offered encouragement and a small amount of support, a group of volunteers in the local community did and continue to do all their great work. 🌻 There are several posts on the things they do, which you can read about by clicking in the Tag Cloud.

The Good Neighbours theme was taken up by the ā€œHopeā€ project in Coventry. A small grant I gave to them to employ a fundraiser has significantly improved their core funding to continue their work in the community. 🌻

Small groups like the ones above are often hard to get started and even harder to keep going. They often compete for funding and attention with much larger and better resourced charities.

Perhaps this business card can help?

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Growing a 🌻

My last post was about a brief encounter with a small charity in Liverpool. So if you follow it, who knows where will this thread will lead?

My first experience of working for a charity was when I joined Coventry Churches Housing Association in January 1979. It was started by a small group of volunteers linked by their Christian faith and a desire to help the homeless in Coventry. Their Chairman was a Jesuit priest who had worked with communities in Liverpool. I spent 10 years at CCHA as part of an inspirational team of people lead by Bill Martin; a man who knew no boundaries and strove relentlessly for improvement and innovation.

In 1987 with Bill’s encouragement and a seed funding loan I set up the ExtraCare charity to develop and manage nursing homes for the elderly as well as managing CCHA’s rented retirement housing. I was able to take several key people from CCHA with me and we remained a team for the next 20 years.

How does this relate to growing 🌻?

Well we started with no public funds most of our capital for new nursing home projects had to be raised from bank loans, but a small proportion came from charitable fundraising. Over the years at ExtraCare we raised over £20 million from a standing start.

ExtraCare’s story is covered earlier in this blog and you can find more posts in the Tag Cloud, ā€œExtraCare Traditionsā€. What started as a seed of an idea about ā€œBetter lives for older peopleā€, turned into a 🌻 that improved the lives of a great many elderly residents of ExtraCare and several thousand staff.

This is a long way from a small charity in Liverpool, but a 🌻 has many seeds and there are some parallels which I will cover in my next post.

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ferris2.jpg 2,338Ɨ1,654 pixels

ferris2.jpg 2,338Ɨ1,654 pixels
— Read on grumblesmiles.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/ferris2.jpg

bungalows

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For Want of a ā€¦.

I met someone really interesting last week. Someone I had never met before, but who answered my enquiring questions directly and without hesitation. No guarded or ambiguous answers, just open straightforward replies.

A far cry from our politicians who these days can rarely think for themselves and are briefed to resort to stock phrases like ā€œ let me be clearā€, which is anything but clear.

He was a fundraiser for a cancer charity in Liverpool, who desperately need money to continue their excellent work in providing advice and support to people with serious health conditions. But he didn’t ask for a donation, nor did he ask why I was asking probing questions.

It was only a brief meeting and I would like to have found out more, but time didn’t allow. So as he left I asked for his business card. Rather surprising to me he didn’t have one.

I suppose it is a sign of our new tech age, where everything is communicated by the internet. Through websites; emails; Facebook; instagram; Reddit; LinkedIn; WhatsApp and even more social media that so many of the Granddad generation don’t participate in or understand.

Business cards are the handshake introduction to any longer term relationship. The biggest donors to charity are older people, so maybe there is a missed opportunity there?

🌻 For want of a business card ! 🌻

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Falling Edukashun Standards.

A recently published report by the OECD – Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development has shown that UK students are falling behind other European countries in terms of standards of literacy. This follows on from an earlier study that pointed to our dropping well behind in the world tables in mathematics.

So what is to be done?

Our decisive leader Sir Keyer Stammer has demanded ā€œACTION NOW!ā€ The Education Secretary- Bridget Phillipson has announced a new challenging curriculum for both issues.

In primary schools all children will be required to recite the whole alphabet from A to Z before they can go to secondary school. Then at secondary school they must be able to rite a hole sendtnse before going to Universitty. Spelling mistakes don’t matter cause u can allways use spelcheque.

The new standard for maths is even higher. Before leaving primary school all students must be able to do the 1 x table at least up to 20. In secondary school you can just ask Siri, because nobody does numbers in the heads anymore.

These new demanding standards will once again elevate Britain’s students to their rightful position in the world rankings.

NOWHERE

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Drink More Water ?

Researchers at Liverpool John Moores University have come up with some very inconvenient advice. They have been studying how much water people drink compared to the NHS advice of one and a half litres a day.

Firstly they found most people are not even drinking that muchā˜¹ļø Even more concerning was their recommendation that we would all be much more alert and healthier if we drank TWO & a HALF LITRES A DAY!

At a time when we are in the hottest summer on record this is difficult advice to swallow. Our reservoirs are drying up; hose pipe bans have been issued; water companies are nearly bankrupt and their charges are rising faster than the water levels.

What’s more, have you ever tried drinking that much water in a day. They must be having a laugh🤔

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Robo LLLP – Step 4

With the help of ChatGPT and AI, the Last Laugh Looney Party of Robo MP’s have solved all of the biggest domestic issues that were concerning the electorate.

Now it is time to turn their attention to major international events, namely Ukraine and Israel &Gaza.

President Tramp has done all the initial undiplomatic work of sowing confusion everywhere. Sir Keyer Stammer has b-b-b-backed him all the way and promised to put boots on the ground. Although he’s not quite sure if that is in Ukraine or Israel or Gaza.

Ever willing to spend more taxpayers hard earned cash, the Ministry of Defence ensured that 500,000 pairs of boots have already been ordered from Doc Martens and we just happen to have 500,000 immigrants twiddling their thumbs and waiting around in hotels ready to fill them🤔

Sir Stammer has called them ā€œthe Army of the Unwillingā€

Once they are deployed/ deported he fully expects to share the Nobel Peace Prize with President Tramp.

ā€œHow lucky we are to have such great politicians who can establish peace in our timeā€

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Robo LLLP – Step 3

The next three issues that weigh heavily on people’s minds are all closely related and reflect a major change in the culture of our society in recent years. SAFTY in your home and your community is the prime responsibility of any Government and quite obviously successively over the last decade our politicians and the judicial system have lost control of this issue. Large areas a of public life have changed beyond all recognition. Dixon of Dock Green has long since retired and been replaced by flack-jacketed coppers in flash cars issuing crime numbers instead of catching criminals.

CRIME. The definition of a crime in the eyes of the police seems to have changed; though not in the minds of the public. Theft is seldom followed up and shoplifting is accepted as an every-day inconvenience. Drug taking is a recreational pastime even though it is illegal. Be careful not to go too fast in your car however, or speed cameras will snap you and wanna-be PC Louis Hamiltons will be on your tail. Fare dodjing is another fun game that will save you outrageous travel costs. Blocking motorways is also a happy way of spending the day, just say you are ā€œ saving the worldā€.

Using AI, cameras everywhere and facial recognition the LAST LAUGH LOONEY PARTY will track and trace all these criminals and with the assistance of PC Robo Dixons on every street corner, they will feel the minor criminals collars, fine them on the spot and bang them up if necessary.

🤔Uman rights lawyers will be most upset!🤔

JUSTICE. The clogged up judicial system will be speeded up now that minor crimes are expeditiously settled by all seeing Robo Cops on every street. The courts will only be used for more serious crimes like hate speech or miss gendering or flag waving demonstrations. Jury’s won’t be required as the all- knowing ROBO JUDGE will be able to quickly assess all-seeing camera evidence and dispense ROBO JUSTICE. Conviction rates will reach an all time high as robots are never wrong🤔

🤔In no time at all offending will fall🤔

PRISONS. Of course initially there will be a lot more convictions. ROBO PROBATION OFFICERS have an answer for that, home detention and ROBO CORRECTIVE TAGS. Thanks to the genius of Elon Must, nurolink chips can be inserted in the heads of offenders and programmed with the required corrective behaviours. Small electric shocks will be administered for any steps taken outside your home during your sentence.

I am sure we will all feel much safer in this Robo controlled world.

🤔Won’t we?🤔

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Robo LLLP – Step 2

Big strides were taken in the first 100 days of the new Last Laugh Looney Government. Now it’s time to move forward with the remaining pressing issues.

SOCIAL CARE. This is an issue that has been prevaricated on for years by all political parties, because nobody wants to face up to the colossal cost or to offend elderly voters by telling them the truth. The brutal reality is that most people have not saved enough for a long retirement, especially if it involves a period of supportive care. The good news is that for many home owners their property has accumulated in value significantly in their lifetime and is an asset which could cover the cost of care. The LLLP will unlock these assets by offering reverse mortgages, that enable the elderly to release money from their houses to pay for care. They will also set up a compulsory social care insurance scheme for people under retirement age. This means inherited wealth will be reduced, but on the positive side it will create many more jobs in the care industry.

INFLATION. Calculations of this are always wrong when you look back on them. All these highly paid economists with no understanding of what is going on in the street. I am surprised that they think they can calculate it to1 decimal point and that anyone puts any store by it. The average man/ woman on the street are only too well aware of the rising price of everything. The Last Laugh Looney Party will immediately introduce a price freeze on all goods and services for two years.

🤔 SIMPLES 🤔

Economy sorted🤔 in the next post we will turn to crimešŸ˜Ž

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LLLP DOUBLE CHECK.

The Last Laugh Looney Party’s first proposals in Government have been quite radical, even if they might seem like common sense to the man/ woman in the street. So before they are enacted the LLLP has a uniquely different approach.

ā€œGAZZA’s PENALTY SHOOT OUTā€. This is an all new Saturday night prime time TV show hosted by Gary Lineker in the hour before Match of the Day. Gary has generously agreed to compare the show for only Ā£1,000,000.

In the simplest of terms Gary will explain the issues that have been discussed in Parliament in the previous week. No action replays, no VAR, no bookings. The viewing audience will then be asked ā€œ do you still want to go ahead and change the law on each issue discussed that week?.ā€ YES/ NO.

In the first half of the programme the viewers can submit amendments to the proposals, e.g.

  • IMMIGRATION – immigrants with Ā£1,000,000 can be allowed.🤔
  • NHS WAITING LISTS – newly qualified doctors and nurses are welcome provided they can speak English or Welsh and promise not to go on strike for a year.
  • CLIMATE CHANGE – fracking will be allowed in all Constituencies that vote either Labour/ Conservative/ Liberal Democrat.

Amendments will be voted on before the final vote takes place. It will be a fast moving, all action show, although there will be no action replays or extra time.

To be eligible to vote you must be over 12 and have lived in the country for at least a day or two.

If over 50% of registered voters say YES, the proposal must be enacted within a week. If majority vote NO then the issue cannot be revisited for a year.

This is carefully designed by the LLLP to ensure the electorate knows what it is doing🤔 and in any case it can’t be worse than the current system.

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