Transcript of the speech given by our Chairperson, Annie Blair, at the press launch for our Centenary celebrations
We are honoured to have so many special attendees with us and I believe between us all in this room we have ‘living memory’ of over 50 years of the organisation’s work and achievements.
So many have given so much collective time to the organisation, so please forgive me for not mentioning individual names because there are simply too many contributors over the last 100 years that have given their time and talents in a voluntary or employed capacity. We hope today is about meeting-up with old and new friends and sharing those memories between us all.
We want to shout about our achievements through engaging the press. I thank you for your interest and taking the time to support us today. We look forward to the stories you might print or speak to us about throughout our Centenary year.
We felt it apt to choose this venue because it was within this College, during the 1920s, that initial discussions took place regarding the plight of the local countryside and where the idea to establish the Cambridgeshire Rural Community Council was first proposed.
We are very grateful for King’s College’s generosity in sponsoring this reception and making it possible for us to all be here today.
There is no doubt 2024 is going to be a special year for Cambridgeshire ACRE, which gives us the opportunity to tell the charity’s fascinating story and celebrate the remarkable achievement of 100 years.
Three clear principles, set as early ideals, seem to still resonate today and I believe our longevity and success as a Charity can be attributed to these.
The first is that organisations that succeed over time are usually ones that can adapt at speed to the external changes around them. This was important in the early days when we were pioneering new ideas to resolve countryside issues and supporting communities through wartime. Similarly, our resilience and ability to galvanise ourselves and others in responding rapidly to the impacts of COVID and the cost-of-living crisis has shown we are still able to adapt our work, giving support to rural communities where and when this is most needed. As an example, we were able to support 150 volunteers within two months to set up 38 Warm Hubs vital to people’s health and welfare over last wintertime.
The second ideal was the importance of collaboration with others, particularly working to coordinate efforts between public, private and voluntary organisations. This was considered much needed in the 1920s to resolve issues that could not be tackled by one organisation alone. Our commitment in leading collaboration between organisations is equally part of our success today. We now refer to these ways of working in more elaborate terms such as partnership working, co-designing, integration or being part of the system.
Our collaboration went further still, in that we led the establishment of many other voluntary & community organisations and we are glad to have representatives from some of them with us today. By facilitating relevant key players to come together, we established committees concerned with vital issues such as landscape, youth and older people. Then when they were equipped, we established them as constituted charities in their own right– for example:
- Cambridgeshire and Peterborough CPRE was the first to become established in 1928;
- We formed the Parish Councils Advisory Service in 1935 which left as Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Parish Council Association in 1985;
- Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Age UK, formerly Age Concern, was formed from the Older Person’s Committee in 1983; and
- In 1977, a public meeting was held in Cambridge to support of the establishment of a City of Cambridge Community Council (the forerunner to today’s Cambridge Council for Voluntary Service).
The third and final factor in our longevity and success has been the skills and hard work of our people who have provided the highest quality support to rural communities over these years. I want to particularly mention the many volunteers from across the 260 parishes who take on roles in their own communities in running village halls, supporting community hubs for the most vulnerable and developing community-owned businesses. These volunteers give their time to ensure the infrastructure of our rural communities remains viable through models of community-ownership and through giving local support.
So I hope you will agree with me, and share my view, that our success is down to the organisation’s agility, our leadership and collaboration with others, the expertise and quality of our staff and the many volunteers who we support across the county who make such a difference in their own rural communities.
As a Board we are keen to use our Centenary to set the stage for the future. In doing so, we strive to involve all our members, partners, and supporters in making sure that our strategies, policies and work remains innovative and, above all, relevant for supporting Cambridgeshire’s rural communities with the opportunities and challenges we know they will face.
