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27.03.2003
Professional services firm Mourant has teamed up with charity Hands Around The World to help people in an impoverished African country.
A team of 11 volunteers, hand picked from Mourant’s 600 staff, will be going to Swaziland this October, to undertake building projects.
Kate Adie is the well-known Patron of Hands Around The World, which is a Charity dedicated to tackling the problems of the poorest countries of the world by offering practical help to relieve suffering.
For a number of years Mourant has run a staff bursary scheme, whereby individuals are allowed the time, and the provision of financial assistance, to enable them to participate in a variety of different projects. The firm was looking for an alternative method of giving Mourant staff the opportunity to do something worthwhile, in which more people could be involved.
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"Mourant was aware of the work of Hands Around The World and its aims fitted well with our objectives, of giving something back to less fortunate communities, but also offering the volunteers themselves a personal challenge and, we hope, very rewarding experience," commented Nicola Davies, Deputy Managing Partner at Mourant.
The chosen area – a small community near Siteki in rural eastern Swaziland, will be an ongoing project for Mourant. The first group of volunteers will be building a domestic science block and some classrooms for the local school. Mourant will fund the building materials costs and the overseas flights for the volunteers, but they will also need to raise some of their own funds for personal expenses. The group will be undergoing some training in the Summer months to prepare them for the trip.
Mourant’s team consists of ten staff members and a builder with strong connections to the firm. There were 31 applicants from Mourant’s network of European offices in response to the initial request for volunteers, and the successful candidates were selected from an application process involving team exercises and personal interviews by Hands Around The World. The Mourant team leader is Phil Ruelle, a software engineer based in one of the firm’s Jersey offices. He commented, "It was very encouraging to see so many volunteers come forward. The high standard of all the applicants made the selection process extremely tough, but I am confident that we have selected a Mourant team to meet this challenge."
The Charity’s Director, Dr. David Steiner, added "We are delighted that Mourant has chosen Hands Around The World for this long-term support. The volunteers have all been through a selection process and their dedication and commitment is already very apparent. We are looking forward to some months of preparation and then a very exciting, and worthwhile, trip in October."
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