The Great British Care Awards are delighted to announce their pledge of support to the Maggie's Centre charity.

2 July 2009

The Great British Care Awards are delighted to announce their pledge of support to the Maggie's Centre charity.

A Maggie's Centre is a place to turn to for help with any of the problems, small or large, associated with cancer. Under one roof people can access help with information, benefits advice, psychological support both individually and in groups, courses and stress reducing strategies. No appointment or referral is necessary as everything offered is free of charge. The centres are there for anybody who feels the need for help, which includes those who love and look after someone with cancer, who often feel as frightened and vulnerable as those who actually have the disease.

The Great British Care Awards are a celebration of excellence across the care sector and are managed by the team behind the Ceretas National Home Care Awards, a high profile annual event for the home care industry. The purpose of the awards is to promote best practice within both home care and care homes sectors, and pay tribute to those individuals who have demonstrated outstanding excellence within their field of work.

There are a total of around eighteen awards categories available for nomination, which represent all areas of the care sector, whether it be older people or specialist services, residential or home care. From frontline staff such as care workers and care managers to people who have made an impact in other ways such as training, IT and innovation.
All the finalists will be invited to attend a spectacular gala dinner at venues throughout the UK, where the winners will be announced. The winners from the regional awards will then be invited to attend the National Events for either Home Care or Care Homes sectors at the prestigious London's Guildhall, in June 2010.

A variety of fundraising initiatives are planned for each of the regional and national awards, the proceeds of which will go to Maggie's Centre.

Sarah Brown, Patron of Maggie's Centre, commented,

"Every time I visit a Maggie's Centre I am so impressed by the way Maggie's have touched a nerve with communities. Its been the same up-and-down the country as people are galvanised into raising money to build a centre for their area. This is illustrated remarkably throughout the UK where hundreds of thousands of pounds has been raised through the local communities. Maggie's Centres are funded by local people for their communities and I want to thank you for supporting Maggie's and making it possible".

Lisa Carr, Director of The Great British Care Awards, said,

"We are delighted to pledge our support to the Maggie's Centre. The Great British Care Awards offer a unique opportunity to celebrate the successes of individuals, teams and businesses throughout the UK - people who really do make a positive impact on people's lives. In the same way the Maggie's echoes our own ethos with centres situated throughout the UK with professionals who really make a difference to people who are impacted in some way by cancer.

Maggie' endorsement of the awards will further to help to raise the profile of social care in our region and we are looking forward to working with them to raise funds for an extremely worth while charity.

For more information on Maggie's Centre please visit www.maggiescentres.org

Let's celebrate social care and help it get the recognition it deserves.

ENDS