Masons Mark East Lancs St John Ambulance

Keith Schofield, the Provincial Grand Master of the Mark Masons for East Lancashire, laid the Foundation Stone of the new Headquarters of St. John Ambulance Greater Manchester in Stockport recently. For the ceremony, senior volunteers from St John Ambulance Greater Manchester were joined by their Chief Executive Officer and many Mark masons.
    The Provincial Grand Lodge is a key donor in assisting the work of St John. The link between the two organisations goes back a long way, starting at the turn of the century when the Mark Grand Master HRH Prince Michael of Kent, presented the Grand Prior of St John, HRH The Duke of Gloucester, with a donation of £2,000,000 for a new fleet of Crusader Ambulances.
    The Mark Masons in East Lancashire have long been regular supporters. In 2001 £5,000 was donated to each region for extra on board ambulance equipment. In 2005 another £5,000 was donated to each St John region. Greater Manchester used this money to purchase specially equipped mountain bikes for rapid response in congested areas.
    St John Ambulance began building the new Centre of Excellence in March 2006, construction work is now well underway, and it is due to be completed in the early spring of 2007. The cost of the land and building is £2,600,000 and St John Ambulance is currently in the process of a major fundraising campaign to meet these costs.

Cavendish Centre Funded by Mark Masons

The Mark Masons of Yorkshire have donated £29,000 to enable the Cavendish Cancer Care Centre in Sheffield to employ a trained therapist for two years to counsel and support the children of cancer sufferers. The Cavendish Centre already offers free support, counselling and treatment to over 900 patients a year. A rise of 70% in the number of referrals to the centre has occurred in the last 2 years alone.
    Founded in 1992, the Cavendish Centre offers supportive care to people with cancer as well as their families, in a relaxed, non-hospital environment close to the centre of Sheffield. Patients are offered rapid access to a range of professional therapies, including counselling, reflexology, hypnotherapy, massage, acupuncture and aromatherapy. The services provided are entirely free and the Cavendish Centre receives very little NHS funding.
    ‘This very kind donation made by the Mark Masons of Yorkshire will enable us to expand our services and support the children of cancer sufferers, a service which is currently not available anywhere in Yorkshire’ said Roy Finch, Chairman of the Board of Trustees for the Cavendish centre.
    The Mark Masons ‘Cleeves and Whitehead Fund’ representing Yorkshire Mark Masons have over the past few years donated a total of two million pounds to the St. Johns Ambulance Brigade enabling them to purchase 30 new fully equipped ambulances and over two million pounds to purchase medical equipment for the treatment of Prostate Cancer.