National Volunteers Week - Day 4

Today is day 4 of National Volunteers week. Throughout this week we would like to showcase and say thanks to a different volunteer or group of volunteers in the Region for their commitment and contribution to volunteering. 

Today we would like to talk about Somerset ASA who was awarded the Queens Award for Voluntary Services. 

Somerset Amateur Swimming Association Management Committee was announced as one of 103 UK volunteering groups to win the 2010 Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service, the MBE for volunteer groups.

The prestigious National Honour recognises outstanding contributions made to local communities by groups voluntarily devoting their time for the benefit of others. It sets the national benchmark for excellence in volunteering, with the work of those awarded being judged of the highest standard.

Somerset Amateur Swimming Association Management Committee has received the Award for providing competitive opportunities for members through supporting and encouraging aquatic development.

Winners of the 2010 Award were selected from 341 groups nominated by members of the public who have been helped personally or witnessed the benefits of a group’s work in their community.

Somerset Amateur Swimming Association Management Committee received The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service Main Award Committee Chair and former broadcast journalist Martyn Lewis CBE said, “Outstanding volunteer groups across the UK all too often go without recognition for the truly amazing work they do, despite the vital part they play in helping bind our communities together. It’s a great pleasure to celebrate the efforts of Somerset Amateur Swimming Association Management Committee with The Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service and help raise awareness of all they do for the benefit of others.”

By 2010 more than 850 groups around the UK, Channel Islands and Isle of Man had now won the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service, over the years since it was created by Her Majesty to mark the occasion of her Golden Jubilee in 2002.