Black Isle volunteers delighted over royal honour for Cromarty Care Project whose volunteer network rose to Covid-19 challenge
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PUBLIC-spirited volunteers in a close-knit Black Isle community have been awarded a right royal honour for their dedicated service.
The Cromarty Care Project has received the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service in recognition of its many initiatives to support residents in and around the burgh town.
In recent times its volunteers have been involved in everything from arranging grocery deliveries so people could stay safe during the Covid pandemic, to work to ensure the elderly and frail do not feel isolated.
And these and numerous other ways volunteers work to make Cromarty a better place to live, have helped to earn the group the award, which recognises outstanding work by groups to benefit their local communities.
The honour was created in 2002 to celebrate the Queen’s golden jubilee. Recipients are announced each year on June 2, the anniversary of the Queen’s coronation, with this year’s award winners being located all over the UK.
Representatives from the Cromarty Care Project are expected to receive the award crystal and certificate from Joanie Whiteford, Lord-Lieutenant of Ross and Cromarty later this summer. Two volunteers will also attend a garden party at Holyrood in July 2022, along with other recipients of this year’s award.
A spokeswoman for the Cromarty Care Project said: “We are delighted to be recognised for all the work that we have done both prior to and as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. Cromarty has got an amazing community spirit with so many local people offering to help with the various projects.
The group has a number of projects running to support Cromarty residents.
Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic they concentrated on ways to improve health and reduce isolation for the elderly and frail in the burgh town. They worked with Highland Home Carers to support home care for local people by local people.
And they also have two Cycling Without Age trikes which are used to take elderly, frail or disabled people out and about around Cromarty for fresh air, a social outing or for shopping trips. It also ran weekly table tennis sessions, which have health benefits in dementia prevention.
During the Covid-19 pandemic the strategy changed towards providing more immediate relief and support for people. This included arranging grocery deliveries from the local store, the creation of a Community Sharing Larder to tackle food poverty, the provision of vouchers for groceries and cleaning equipment, and a back-to-school grant to assist struggling families, among others.
