Another step for our small charity
Our charity formed in 2017.
A conversation between 4 outraged clergy wives at the treatment of Syrian refugees, led to a public meeting in Shaftesbury Town Hall. We needed to know that the local community would accept and support people displaced from Syria. Anticipating some 30 people, there were over 100 present to hear the experience of a Syrian family already settled in Bournemouth. A Dorset Resettlement Officer explained how people could help, and a Salisbury Diocesan Social Justice Officer helped us reflect on migration within our own histories and families. We began to help three families from Syria settle in our beautiful area and build new lives after the trauma of war in their homeland.
The support from the people of Shaftesbury and Gillingham and adjacent towns and villages has been consistent and warm since 2017 and when, in February 2022, the war in Ukraine escalated they began to provide homes for Ukraine and sponsor families and vulnerable people to come to North Dorset and South Wiltshire.
With our limited experience of giving support we helped where we could and gave advice and financial support to people who had left Ukraine with very little.
We connected with other agencies through Dorset Together, developed partnerships and good friends in our local community. We became more public facing with our website, and began raising funds to give aid , meet needs and put on events to build community.
As our experience grew we became more confident that as a charity we could help people displaced to our community and make a difference where and when it was most needed.
Our income increased tenfold from a little over £1,000 in 2021 to over £12,000 in 2022 with generous donors and our fund raising events. We took the decision at our AGM in June 2023 to go forward with our registration with the Charities Commission and applied on 5th July. On 18th September 2023 we were registered as Shaftesbury Refugee Group Registered Charity Number 1204787.
We do not have ambitions beyond our geographic area of ‘Shaftesbury, Gillingham, Motcombe and the adjacent towns and village’s and want to remain true to our origins of meeting a genuine need with a genuine community response.
We hope to be here for displaced people and to work within and through the generous communities of North Dorset and South Wiltshire to help where we can.
If you would like to do the same, please contact us.
Shaftesbury Refugee Group
