Cat Curtis (second from the left) and other Vets4Pets colleagues painting at Buckhurst Park Community Centre
Vet Group Offer Helping Hand To Local Community
5 years ago 
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A national veterinary group has donated around 480 hours of volunteer work to a number of local charities and organisations.
As part of Vets4Pets’ third ‘Community Day’ initiative, 60 colleagues from the group’s support office lent a pair of helping hands to seven local good causes in the Swindon area, where its Support Office is based.
Vets4Pets moved to Swindon in 2016 and its Support Office currently employs more than 200 people from in and around Wiltshire.
Each of the colleagues helped with a variety of tasks to support the local organisations throughout the day on Friday 14th June, from painting and decorating, to gardening and DIY.
Dr Cat Curtis MRCVS, CSR Lead and Veterinary Talent Manager at Vets4Pets, said: “As a veterinary group, we are always supporting and working with various animal and pet welfare groups or charities, but we are also passionate about helping out our local community.
“We love having our headquarters in Swindon, and being involved in the local area is of great importance to the Support Office team.
“We are already partnered with some of the local colleges in Swindon, but we are always looking for new ways that we can be a part of, and give back to, the community.
“Offering our support and time to some brilliant local causes felt like the perfect opportunity to do that, which is how our ‘Community Day’ initiative first came about.
“There are so many brilliant charities and groups around Swindon, that it was hard to narrow down which ones we could offer our assistance to. We wanted to support a range of causes, from helping children and the elderly, to improving the local environment.
“This year we also mixed up the volunteer teams with colleagues from across the many departments in the Support Office, to encourage cross functional working and bonding.”
Legge House Wroughton, South Marston Parish Council, Buckhurst Park Community Centre, Swindon Women’s Aid, Whitbourne House, Prospect Hospice and Hop, Skip & Jump, are the organisations the Vets4Pets teams offered their time and assistance to.
Swindon Women’s Aid provides 24-hour emergency refuge and support to victims of domestic abuse, housing families in need in its purpose-built complex. One team visited the refuge to paint and decorate a number of resident flats.
Jo Wyn Griffith, volunteer co-ordinator at Swindon Women’s Aid, said: “We have 22 families living on our complex at any given time, and we work hard to ensure that they are provided with the nicest and safest environment possible.
“Having volunteers helping us means that our paid members of staff’s time is free to support the families in our care, as well as those out in the community, and so the Vets4Pets colleagues coming to help paint the residents’ flats to help give them the best environment possible was very much appreciated.”
Whilst another group decorated rooms and built a sensory wall at Hop, Skip & Jump’s Swindon centre, which provides high-quality respite care to children and young adults with disabilities and has a number of centres throughout the country, from Lancashire to Bristol.
Clarissa Legg, centre manager at Hop, Skip & Jump, said: “Vets4Pets helped us during their last Community Day, and it was really nice that they could come down and offer their support again this year.
“The colleagues helped us to build a sensory wall of all different materials, which the children in our care can use to relax and calm down. This will be a great asset to our centre, and we really thank the team for all their help.”
This is the first Community Day the Support Office is hosting this year in order to give back to the local community, with another to follow later on in the year.
“We are thrilled so many colleagues stepped forward to get involved with the ‘Community Day’ and hopefully our hours of volunteered time will help to make a positive change in the community,” concluded Cat.
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