The Latest News about South Bucks Talking News

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Meeting Mary Berry and Pippa Kirkbride, the High Sherriff of Buckinghamshire

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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South Bucks Talking News participated in this year’s Golden Years event in Bourne End which was organised by BOPAG (Bucks Old People’s Action Group) and Heart of Bucks. It was very successful event with over 300 attendees and 35+ local charities and community organisations focused on supporting the elderly exhibiting.

The event was opened by the popular TV chef and baker Mary Berry and also graced by the presence of the High Sherriff of Buckinghamshire, Pippa Kirkbride, dressed in her official regalia.

The Office of High Sheriff is an independent non-political Royal appointment for a single year. The origins of the Office date back to Saxon times. Today their role is "to uphold and lend active support to the principal organs of the Constitution – the Royal Family, the Judiciary, the Police, the Prison Services and other law enforcement agencies, the emergency services, local authorities, and all recognised church and faith groups."

SBTN Committee Members Tony Bull, Ray Isted and Alison Wray represented our charity and were able to show both Mary and Pippa how the talking newspaper helps the print-disabled community in southern Buckinghamshire to keep in touch with what is happening in their local communities. They were both very impressed with our service and thanked us and all our volunteers for what we do to support our disadvantaged listeners.

 

Probus Support for Talking News

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Probus (High Wycombe) lunch club, which meets monthly for a convivial lunch and to hear interesting speakers, has supported South Bucks Talking News with a significant donation. The Club meets on the 3rd Thursday each month at Hazlemere Golf Club and raffle prizes on each occasion, the proceeds of which are donated annually to charities of their choice.

President of the Club, Jim May, presented a cheque to Tony Bull, the Chair of South Bucks Talking News, saying that the charity had been selected from a long list of ten as several committee members knew directly of the charity’s support for friends, relatives or acquaintances, and how beneficial it was in bringing the local news to them from which they would otherwise be shut off. Jim also mentioned the charity’s circumspect use of funds as an important factor.

Tony thanked the Club for their generosity and gave a short talk to the members about the talking newspaper and the service it delivers to some of the most vulnerable people in our communities.

 

40th Celebration Party

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Celebration of 40 years of providing local news to the visually impaired.

Volunteers at South Bucks Talking News gathered together in March at Hazlemere Golf Club for a tea party to celebrate 40 years since the first recordings were sent out to listeners in March 1985. In those days they were distributed on cassette tapes, then CDs, and now on USB sticks or over the internet.

The founder and first chairman, Bob Gerhardt, who is himself blind, told current volunteers of the problems in getting the original funding and then setting up the organisation, which he said he was astonished and delighted to find still thriving today, 40 years on. He and current chair, Tony Bull, thanked those present for all their work in supporting the charity and for providing the listeners with a window into local events from which they would otherwise be shut off.

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