Dublin Bus helps community and voluntary groups across the capital to make a difference in their local areas

Earlier in the summer, Dublin Bus announced the winners of the 2020 Community Spirit Awards. 65 voluntary and community groups operating around the Capital and Greater Dublin Area received the wonderful, uplifting news that they were awarded a grant of €1,000, €2,000 or €5,000.

Since 2004, the Community Spirit Awards has provided much-need funds for local community and voluntary groups allowing them to play their part in making a difference to the lives of Dubliners.

This year five groups won the top €5,000 award, 15 groups received €2,000 and a further 45 received €1,000.

The top five winning groups were:

ARC Cancer Support Centre (ARC), who will use the funding to introduce the first holistic family service, replicating a model already used in Northern Ireland. It will address the needs of families, starting with children, who have a significant family member, for example a parent, who has received a cancer diagnosis. ARC will pilot initiatives which embrace the needs of these children, teens and parents.

Coombe Care, who will use its award to provide support to families accessing care in its hospital. The project will provide approximately 400-500 women living in its catchment area, some of whom are living in emergency accommodation, with basic essentials to ensure they are able to give birth with dignity.

Family Carers Ireland, who will fund much-valued care packages for 50 young carers from the Dublin area. A young carer is a child or young person under the age of 18 who cares for, or helps to care for, a loved one with an illness, disability, mental health issue or a drug or alcohol dependency.

SeniorLine, who help older volunteers in Dublin to support older people nationwide, is Ireland’s only national dedicated peer-to-peer telephone service for older people. COVID-19 restrictions have meant that volunteers have not been able to take part in monthly in-person support and supervision, so they will use their grant to purchase smart phones for volunteers so that they can continue to receive helpline calls and also attend ongoing online training sessions which will enhance the quality of SeniorLine’s service.

Global Action Plan, who in partnership with Young Ballymun, will continue the delivery of its Nature Explorer programme for toddlers and afterschooler children living in emergency accommodation in the local Ballymun community. It aims to create a sensory space for children and parents living in emergency accommodation to safely and intuitively explore the natural world, helping them to establish confidence and trust in nature and their surroundings, and in doing so, ensuring they are physically and emotionally healthy and secure and have multiple opportunities to reach their full potential

You can review the full list of winning groups here and the Dublin Bus campaign video here

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