Volunteer firefighters
Last week was Volunteer Awareness Week, a chance to recognise the great work done by so many people in our community.
As a small thank you on behalf of the community, I dropped a few muffins into the volunteers working at the Jack Allen House in Levin, which houses many community groups.
Around a million New Zealanders volunteer in some way, from coaching sports teams, helping the elderly to cleaning up the environment.
Society as we know it just couldn’t function without the efforts of people who want to help others.
Volunteer firefighters in particular perform a very important service. On Saturday I took part in the opening of the new, extended Shannon Volunteer Fire Brigade Station which will be a great asset for the whole community.
Funds for the new building came from a variety of sources, including Community Trusts, lottery grants and local fundraising.
It was great to see neighbouring brigades at the opening, including Tokomaru, Foxton and Levin.
These days it is not just fires, but a whole range of accidents and emergencies that these men and women deal with. Road accidents, medical emergencies, floods and natural disasters are all part of the work. In fact only half of the callouts in Shannon over the last 12 months have been for fires.
The Shannon Fire Brigade is also supporting a great new programme to get smoke alarms into local homes, due to kick off in the next six months or so.
I also visited firefighters in Christchurch again last week in my role as Minister Responsible for the New Zealand Fire Service. I met with Lyttleton, Sumner and Sockburn stations who have all been extremely busy helping people in the aftermath of the quakes.
It’s very humbling to hear stories of how the homes of many firefighters have been badly damaged, yet they still rush off to help others in need.
If you are interested in picking up some volunteer work there are a huge range of local organisations who would appreciate any extra help.
A good place to start is Volunteer Kapiti (04 905 8884), who coordinate people and roles. www.volunteeringnz.org.nz also has roles and information from around the country.