Grand Charity Helps Injured Service Personnel

The Freemasons’ Grand Charity has donated £100,000 to enable severely injured members of the armed forces to have the support of their families as they recover from their injuries.
     As a result of the UK’s military engagement in Afghanistan and Iraq, a growing number of servicemen and women are returning home with serious injuries. Many also suffer from complex traumas and emotional problems. Most are cared for at the Royal College of Defence Medicine at Selly Oak, near Birmingham and the Defence Medical Rehabilitation Centre at Headley Court in Surrey.
     These patients often have to come to terms with injuries that make it impossible for them to lead normal lives and that require them to face difficult choices. The presence and support of their families, many of whom live a long way away, can help them enormously in this process.
     When Sue Norton’s husband, Captain Peter Norton GC, was injured in Iraq in 2005 he was initially flown back to a military hospital in Germany.
     She and her two young sons were able to stay nearby at the American forces’ Fisher House, one of a network of Fisher Houses providing a ‘home away from home’ for families of patients at major US military medical centres. But when Peter was moved to Selly Oak in the UK, there were no similar facilities available for his family.
     That’s where SSAFA (the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association) Forces Help came in. Sue got in touch with SSAFA, and the organisation was quick to recognise the need and to respond to it with a plan to open two homes for families of patients at Selly Oak and Headley Court, funded by a special ‘Home from Home’ appeal.
     This February, less than a year after Sue highlighted the issue, the first home, at Ashtead, near Headley Court, was open.
     Named SSAFA Norton House in recognition of the Norton family, it is already getting rave reviews from the families using it:
     “It’s absolutely brilliant. … The house is very comfortable, homely (and luxurious!), and it was so good to be able to spend time being a ‘normal’ couple, away from Headley Court. It’s an amazing place.”
     A second similar home is planned near Selly Oak. Each will have accommodation for about six families. Typical stays will last from two days to a week, sometimes accompanied by the injured person, and many families will make repeat visits.
     The homes will be fully equipped to enable the patients and their families, including children, to spend time together in private.
     The Freemasons’ Grand Charity’s donation will take SSAFA significantly closer to its £5 million appeal target – over £3.8 million has been raised already. SSAFA has a long and distinguished record of meeting the needs of service people and their families – especially needs which cannot be met by government – since its origins over 120 years ago.
     Welcoming the receipt of planning permission for Norton House last August, Secretary of State for Defence Des Browne said: “I would like to thank SSAFA Forces Help and all those who have worked hard over the last few months to provide this home-from-home for families with a loved one recovering at Headley Court”.
     The Freemasons’ Grand Charity is proud to be supporting this appeal. Major General Andrew Cumming, SSAFA Forces Help Chief Executive, was delighted with the charity’s donation.
     He said: “The servicemen and women will benefit from having their families close by while they are undergoing treatment, having suffered often appalling injuries in the service of the UK. This generous donation from The Freemasons’ Grand Charity will help us ensure they have the best chance possible of returning to worthwhile and fulfilling lives.”

CONTACT DETAILS

     60 Great Queen Street, London WC2B 5AZ
     Tel: 020 7395 9261
     Fax: 020 7395 9295
     info@the-grand-charity.org
     www.grandcharity.org