Tag: New South Wales

How Charity Sunday works: for every comment made on this blog post, I will donate money to a charity found in this article. The same promise is made for every blog site listed in the group–click the link at the bottom of this post to see the list of participants and read/comment on any of them to see a donation go to that blogger’s charity. We’re all different! Thanks for your help and your participation!

Note: I posted this first on Friday, December 20 because I couldn’t wait to say something. Please consider this an early Charity Sunday!

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Volunteer: a person who freely offers to take part in an enterprise or undertake a task.

Whether they volunteer with world-wide organisations such as Doctors Without Borders, environmental conservation programs, caring for refuges, wildlife conservation, local welfare groups and mums preparing lunches at the school canteen, we cannot put a price on their contributions to our communities. We thank our military, and now I’d like to thank our volunteers, also.

Never has that one word been as important as it is now in Australia.
This week we said thank you and farewell to the New Zealand firefighters and welcomed teams from Canada and the United States. These wonderful people willingly travelled thousands of miles to join our firefighters battling massive blazes in New South Wales and Queensland. Approximately 1,618,700 hectares, or 4 million acres (give or take an acre) have been affected and more than 1,000 homes across NSW and Queensland have been destroyed. We’ll never know how many homes and lives were saved by the courageous dedicated fireys facing these massive walls of flames. In broad terms, each state’s Rural Fires Service is the volunteer arms of the Fire and Emergency Services. New South Wales Rural Fire Service is the largest volunteer fire service in the world, and right now they, and our interstate fireys are stretched to the limit by the enormity of this disaster. So, thanks again to our Kiwi mates and the Americans and Canadians for giving us their time and invaluable help.

However, these men and women couldn’t keep going without the back-up Fire Service volunteers, the Salvation Army, the Red Cross, the Country Women’s Association, St Vincent de Paul, and Lifeline, to name a few. In good times and in bad times, they are always here when we need them for financial help, food, clothing, household goods, emergency accommodation and trauma counselling. In every city and town, volunteers run Opportunity Shops (Thrift stores) selling second-hand goods for charities. One small Op Shop in Tuncurry, on the NSW coast, supports the local disabled children as well as the fire brigade, the rescue helicopter, the Royal Flying Doctor Service and other community services. This year they also donated $12,000 to Rural Aid to help drought-stricken farmers and water transport to country towns running dry. Multiply this by the countless donations and services provided by volunteers around the world and we must ask ourselves ‘where would we be without them?’

Volunteers from WIRES (Wildlife Information, Rescue and Education Service) and other similar groups have been facing these fires to rescue our unique wildlife. Sadly, many of these defenceless animals have perished but a lot are now receiving treatment and care, often in volunteers’ homes. Bear the Dog, a canine volunteer, is doing his best to find and rescue burned and injured koalas.

So, to all volunteers, the words ‘thank you’ are very inadequate. Indeed, we’d be lost without you.

Before I close, I want to share this heartwarming news item from Queensland.

Wishing you all a very happy Christmas and a wonderful, safe new year. And… Please send rain!!

[Note: Jan wanted to share this post with us because her country is burning all around her. She is not asking you to contribute anything. However, should you wish to donate–whether to support the firefighters, to help groups who are helping those who have been left homeless, or to support wildlife rescue–I (Dee) ask that you please see the links in this article. And thank you! –Dee]

Jan Selbourne

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