Women’s Aid ABCLN CEO Rosemary Magill and Pam Cameron MLA have joined with staff and volunteers to celebrate Volunteer Week 2023 in The Dunadry Hotel & Gardens.
The theme for Volunteer Week 2023 ‘Celebrate and Inspire’ aims to recognise the incredible impact that volunteering has for organisations like Women’s Aid ABCLN and demonstrate the many ways in which volunteers and supporters can get involved.
Founder of Women’s Aid ABCLN, Rosemary has been at the helm for twenty-five years and says “Volunteers have always been the bedrock of Women’s Aid ABCLN bringing a vast array of skills and expertise to the organisation and enabling us to provide much needed services for women and children affected by domestic abuse in the local community.”
Rosemary who will retire later this summer says “I want to personally thank each and every volunteer who has supported Women’s Aid ABCLN and acknowledge your commitment and dedication to our work whether that is by facilitating groups and courses with women, supporting children & young people, helping to raise vital funds, serving on the Management Board or volunteering in our Safe Haven Garden. Thank you for all that you do.”
Friend and supporter Pam Cameron MLA commenting after the event said “It is very fitting that this year’s theme of ‘celebrate and inspire’ should be launched by Rosemary Magill who is quite simply one of the most inspiring women I have had the privilege to know. Under her leadership, Women’s Aid ABCLN has helped thousands of women and children in their most desperate time of need. As Rosemary prepares for her well-deserved retirement, I look forward to watching her legacy continue long into the future as we strive to raise awareness of the blight of domestic violence in Northern Ireland.”
“Women’s Aid ABCLN is of course, a charitable organisation which relies heavily on volunteers to provide the level of support required daily and it was fitting that we should pay tribute to them today. I also, want to take this opportunity to wish my friend, Rosemary Magill MBE all the very best for the future, although I’m quite sure I will still be looking to her for wisdom and guidance as much as I have done previously!”
Women’s Aid ABCLN provides confidential support, information and emergency accommodation for women and children who are affected by domestic abuse across Antrim, Ballymena, Carrickfergus, Larne and Newtownabbey.
For more information about how you can volunteer with Women’s Aid ABCLN you can call 028 25 632136 or go to womens-aid.org.uk/project/volunteering