Rotary Day takes place each year on 23rd February, marking the anniversary of when Rotary was first founded by Paul Harris in 1905. This year we celebrate Rotary's 116th birthday.

Current Rotary GB&I President, Tom Griffin, looks at how after 116 years, Rotary's support for communities at home and abroad is more relevant than ever before.

We're very sorry to announce that for a second year running Yate and District Rotary Club have taken the decision to cancel the annual beer and music festival which was due to take place on Friday and Saturday 9th and 10th July.

With lockdown in place and a date when the restrictions will be fully lifted still unknown, we have had to make the difficult choice of cancelling this year’s event before further costs are incurred.

Yate and District Rotary Club will confirm later in the year if our event will be taking place in 2022 and if so, what the dates will be.

Many thanks for all your support. Take care and stay safe everyone.

Tonight’s guest speaker was Ian Riddell - Community Support Officer and fundraiser for the Southmead Hospital Charity (part of the North Bristol NHS Trust).

With a virtual audience consisting of members from both Yate and Chipping Sodbury Rotary clubs, Ian explained what the charity does and the areas of the hospital it helps to support.

The Southmead Hospital Charity supports five areas:

• Research (Including brain tumour and Parkinsons research)

• Support for patients (Entertaining and interacting with patients and loaning iPads to patients so they can access the outside world)

• Support for staff (Providing staff with access to microwaves, hand cream/moisturiser and a bereavement fund to support families of staff members who have passed away during the COVID crisis)

• Equipment (Recent purchases include two state of the art robots to assist in prostate surgery. The hospital will soon be purchasing a digital microscope to aid brain surgery)

• Buildings and spaces (Updating buildings. The hospital are in the process of making the building look and feel more welcoming and dementia friendly)

The charity is currently raising funds to investigate the impacts of “Long COVID”.

Ian's talk was very informative and resulted in many questions from those attending. A really enjoyable evening and we thank Ian for giving up his time to speak to us.

To find out more about the charity go to https://www.southmeadhospitalcharity.org.uk

The Rotary Club of Yate and District are celebrating a landmark charitable achievement as one of hundreds of Rotary clubs from across the country to contribute over £1 million to Lendwithcare, a microfinance charity which enables people in the UK to make small loans to entrepreneurs from poor communities around the world.

Since October 2011, Rotary clubs across the UK have been raising funds to make small loans to entrepreneurs in developing countries, enabling them to start or expand their small businesses and work their way out of poverty, feed their families and send their children to school.

More than £1 million has now been lent by Rotary to farmers, tailors, market stallholders and food producers to name just a few of the types of businesses Rotary have helped in 11 countries across Africa, Asia and South America.

The first Rotary club to join Lendwithcare was Currie Balerno Rotary Club in Midlothian, and the Rotary Club of Yate and District followed suit in 2015.

The Rotary Club of Yate and District have raised and lent a total of £5,048, contributing towards the national £1 million landmark, with the club loaning to entrepreneurs in 11 countries. The Club has made 40 micro loans, helping 135 entrepreneurs, 289 family members and creating 70 jobs.

Our Rotary Club are proud to be a part of this fantastic initiative. Lendwithcare is a great way to help people out of poverty. You see exactly who the money is going to, and what they will use it for.

The entrepreneur uses the funds to help them to earn a living, often employing family members and neighbours as well, helping to lift their communities out of poverty. They pay the loans back, which can be re-lent to person after person.

It has been much publicised in the media in the last few days, that many of our school children are unable to access their online lessons, either to learn or to submit their work, or to conduct research on the internet, because they have no computer at home.

Our schools are doing a fantastic job, somehow managing to teach the children of key workers who have to be in school, and at the same time, provide a curriculum online for the children who are home-schooling.

There must be many people in our community who have recently upgraded their home computers, or indeed their office computers, and now have unused laptops or tablets.

If you have an unused laptop which you would like to donate to a school for use by a child without access to the internet, please get in touch with Yate Rotary Club. We are working with the BBC Computers for Schools campaign, and with Business2Schools, a national charity enabling a network of donors and schools.

We can collect your device from you, and have the expertise within our group to be able to wipe it clean. Then we can pass it to a local school to have the correct programs loaded, and the school will identify a child or older student who needs it.

If you can offer a laptop or tablet, please get in touch via the website: www.yaterotaryclub.co.uk or telephone Marian Gilpin on 01454 321323.