Page 82 - Mercian Eagle 2016

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The Mercian Benevolence Charity
This financial year has continued to be extremely demanding in assisting requests for help from both our serving soldiers and our veteran community.
Benevolence Cases and Expenditure
So far in the first 11 months of this financial period of 2016-17 we have actioned 223 requests for Benevolence, these figures are a 14% increase to the same period
last year. We have distributed over £70k
in grants so far which is £16k up on last year’s comparison. The surge in demand has come from our antecedent regiment veterans, who are experiencing health difficulties, and also by our success with soldiers Personnel Recovery Centres (PRU) contacting us to support injured soldiers due to be discharged. So far this financial year the Army Benevolent Fund has provided over £41k in grants to
assistance from the Army Benevolent Fund. The fund is also supported by the Welfare Staff of 1 MERCIAN who ran a Christmas Party for the children of soldiers deployed both in the Ukraine and Lithuania in December 2016.
Day’s Pay Scheme
The team at RHQ has worked hard to maintain the amount of funding we receive from our serving soldiers Day’s Pay Scheme (DPS), this includes giving regular briefs
to new soldiers passing out of the Infantry Training Centre at Catterick. So far we
have maintained our 100% record that all new soldiers have signed into the scheme. We are in the process of signing members of 4 MERCIAN onto DPS, although their contributions are only a 10th of what a regular soldier pays. We are adopting a
reservists in the past (which has never
been in large numbers), but we are finding increasingly that 4 MERCIAN soldiers are deploying alongside the regular Battalions of the Field Army around the world.
Donations/Forecast of Expenditure
We continue to donate £10k to the Army Benevolent Fund, and support our own Regimental Remembrance activities
across all Counties, including Crich and Remembrance Sunday. We have been required to raise our initial forecast of case grant expenditure from £65k to £80k, due to the increase in demand on the fund this year. Note that we receive around £56k from the Days Pay Scheme (direct from serving soldiers), therefore we are anticipating an over expenditure of £24k this year.
The Worshipful Company of Bowyers held a Charity Dinner held on Thursday
02 June 2016 at the Honourable
Artillery Company in London. This was extremely successful event that raised over £32k for the Benevolent Fund (and has successfully filled our funding gap for this Financial Year without breaking into our reserved funds). The event was supported by both 1, 2 and 4 MERCIAN, complete
support our welfare cases. In respect of Antecedent Regimental veterans, we have actioned 146 cases and distributed £47k in grants and obtained a further £35k in financial
Miss Grace Westwood and part of her WW1 display
So far we have maintained our 100% record that all new soldiers have signed into the scheme.
whole Army policy that does not differentiate between regular and reservist soldiers ability to get help
with the fund should they find themselves in difficulties. We have always assisted
THE MERCIAN EAGLE