Irish Red Cross General Assembly 2005

Friends, members, and esteemed guests, I’m very pleased to be here with you at this the second General Assembly of the Irish Red Cross, to review our work to date and together to chart our path ahead for the future.

As I speak to you here in Galway, the consequences of yet another calamitous disaster continue to unfold in Pakistan where we now believe that over 40,000 people have lost their lives and hundreds of thousands are sleeping in freezing and wet weather with little or no protection. By now, many of you will have heard our Delegate, Willie Norton, who is appealing to donors for more help.

This appeal follows a period of momentous sorrow and grief for millions of people worldwide, since our last General Assembly, the Irish Red Cross has launched appeals for seven major disasters and facilitated the public’s wish to donate by accepting donations for both the victims of the Beslan School atrocity and more recently, the victims of Hurricane Katrina, in New Orleans.

Of the seven appeals, which include Iraq, the Bam earthquake in Iran, hunger and need in Sudan, HIV/AIDS in Ghana & Senegal and flooding in Bangladesh, hunger and need in Niger, and the tsunami in Asia and Africa, this last has been by far our greatest achievement to date, with over €30 million raised in public donations.

Critical to our success was the involvement of you, our own members. Your energy and enthusiasm for the tsunami appeal symbolised all that is good about our organisation, the strengths that we have by working together for the alleviation of suffering both overseas and, of course, here at home.

Our work in disasters is likely to grow rather than diminish; our own Red Cross figures show that the number of people affected by disasters now stands at 2.54 billion people – nearly half the world’s population – reflecting a 46% increase in a decade.

On the home front, it has also been a very busy two years. During this time we have also invested in new vehicles, equipment and training. We have added new services and expanded old ones. These are the features of an organisation that is characterised by growth and renewal.

This was particularly appreciated two years ago, by the organisers and participants of the Special Olympics, when many of you here in this room and around the country worked all hours to ensure that this prestigious meeting ran smoothly.

This was enabled through the enhanced capacity of our First Aid services; the Irish Red Cross now has about 90 ambulances, most of which were acquired in the last four years under seven separate schemes of ambulance replacement.

And our new Automated External Defibrillator or AED units will be vital in combating the sad trend of deaths – particularly among young people – by providing in-situ life-saving equipment to people in communities around the country.

Both the ambulances and the AED units are essential to the development of the Irish Red Cross First Responder capacity that will ensure that the professional emergency services can rely on our organisation to provide the back-up that is needed to save lives.

To date 80 First Responder Equipment kits, including AED units, have been provided to ambulances and plans are underway to equip all of our ambulances with this equipment.

Training our own personnel in the use of this equipment is also continuing. Not only have we trained 350 people to use this equipment, but we have also trained 72 people as instructors so that more people still can be trained.

This is in line with the general increase in the number of people trained recently which shows an increase of just over a thousand. These figures include people who were trained not only in First Aid, but also in other – and in some cases – new services. In this regard, I would like to congratulate our colleagues here in the west for getting the first Irish Red Cross search and rescue vessel launched.

While I don’t want to steal the thunder of any of my fellow speakers, I must draw your attention to the development of the Skin Camouflage service which is underway with ten Skin Camouflage practitioners based around the country in Cork, Dublin, Donegal, Galway, Wicklow and Wexford. This is a very important addition to our valuable therapeutic services to people, and ensures that we as an organisation develop strong bonds with the communities and people that we serve.

Among our most priceless assets in this regard is our young people; As an organisation, it is essential that the Irish Red Cross constantly renews and replenishes its most valuable resource, which is you the members.

This is why it is in all our interests to support our youth service as it strives to draw-in more young people and to ensure that those young people who are already members receive our highest respect and the full protection of their rights.

All of this work would not be possible without the growth in public awareness and stature of the organisation. Knowledge of our work and services and the role that we play in dealing with human suffering continues to rise among the media, public, donors and our partner organisations. New media offer even greater opportunities to spread knowledge about our work and provide greater access to our services, and in this regard the development of the new website, will be greatly enriched by your participation here today.

Underpinning all of this activity is the raising of vitally needed funds, not just to answer the immediate needs of desperate people at the time of appeals, but also to pay for the provision of day-to-day services. On this note, I have to pay tribute to our corporate partners, Royal & Sun Alliance Insurance and Unilever, who have supported our work over the last five years.

During this time, we have seen some of our most successful awareness-raising campaigns through the publication of the Handbook for Babysitters & Parents, the Carers Handbook and the Hygiene for Health booklet.

Sadly, as we sit here today we must be mindful of the fact that many of those who were with us at our last gathering are not with us here today.

I know that many of you were shocked this week to learn of the unimaginable tragedy visited upon our well-known member from Donegal, Annette Duffy, who lost both her son, Gavan, and her nephew, Darren Quann in the horrific car crash last weekend.

Sadly, these were not the only young people to lose their lives, another young member from Meath – Claire Cusack – was one of the schoolgirls who lost her life in the bus crash during the summer.

Yet another road accident was responsible for the death of the Chairman of the Clonakilty Branch, John O’Mahony.

For all these people and for our other lost colleagues; Dominic Nugent of Drogheda, Co. Louth; Margaret Caffrey of Mullingar, Co. Westmeath; Brigadier General PD Hogan, former Chairman; Denis Murphy of Cork; Clare Ryan of Kilkenny; and Bob Staveley of Dún Laoighaire/Rathdown; I ask you all to rise and join me in a minute’s silent reflection on the contribution of these people.

Finally may I thank you, the members for all your very hard work over the past two years and in particular can I thank our Secretary General, Carmel Dunne and her staff who have worked unceasingly and with no effort spared, to ensure that your aims are fulfilled. In particular, I would like to thank them for their organisation of today’s event and to wish all of you who have made the effort to come here, a satisfying and productive day.

Thank you ladies and gentlemen, I now pass you over to our treasurer and Chairman of our Finance Working Group, Mr Des Kavanagh.