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SCAR wins Partnership Working Award.
On Friday 26th November 2010 I attended the Salisbury NHS Foundation Trust Striving for Excellence Awards at Salisbury District Hospital, together with a number of SCAR committee members, as SCAR had been shortlisted for the Partnership Working Award. SCAR was up against some stiff competition from within the hospital with three other nomonies for the award. To our surprise and pleasure SCAR were named as the winner of the Partnership Working Award. I had the honour of receiving a certificate on behalf of SCAR from Luke March, Chairman of the NHS Trust.
SCAR is really grateful to the Trust for the support it has given over the past two years and looks forward to continuing to work together in the future to promote good community relations and defeat racism.
SCAR would like to thanks all those who have signed up to support the coalition, especially those who have turned out and assisted at the
various events we have been involved with over the past two years. We hope that you will be able to join us for some exciting events in the future.
Rex Webb, Chair of SCAR
AGM - 20 September 2010
The SCAR AGM took place at Salisbury District Hospital on Monday 20th September 2010. A number of SCAR members were present and elected the SCAR committee. They also elected a Chair, Secretary and Treasurer.
Chair - Rex Webb
Treasurer - Morris Munns
Secretary - Heather Patrick
Committee Members:
Sandy Woodbridge
Bob Cook
Jo Howse
Pamela Permallo-Bass
Fiona Hulbert
The meeting heard that since June 2010 SCAR has become a voluntary organisation. The new Terms of Reference were endorsed at the AGM with four main aims for SCAR:
1. Promote good community relations in Salisbury and South Wilts
2. Raise awareness of the diverse communities living and working within Salisbury and South Wilts
3. Raise awareness of racism in Salisbury and South Wilts
4. Assit others across Wiltshire and Swindon to do the above.
The meeting also heard from Toozali Community Arts about the possiblity of completing an Arts project with SCAR next year entitled "flags for friendship". Funding is being sourced for this project.
Following the business of the meeting delegates heard from Kamran Miah (15 yrs) who described his election as Head Boy of Wyvern College. Kamran gave a very good speech which included the following: “To really cure racism we have to change our mentality and look at things from a different perspective.......” he went on to say “Don’t look at what sets us apart, look at what brings us together. We all have a common aim which is basically to live our lives and be happy. We can do that together all of us can live happily if we put race to one side and look at each other as just people. We’re all linked to each other, we’re all part of one big community and if we try we can solve our differences and live in harmony.”
Since the meeting Kamran has now joined the SCAR committee as it's youth member.
April 2010
The SCAR working group has now formally become the SCAR Committee - we are in the process of formalising SCAR in order to enhance the work that we can undertake. At the last meeting we agreed that until an Annual General Meeting can be organised later this year SCAR will be Chaired by Rex Webb, He will be assisted by Morris Munns acting as Treasurer and Heather Patrick as Secretary. Full details of Committee members will be posted on the website soon. We will be notifying all those who have signed-up to SCAR of the date of the AGM very shortly. If you can assist the Coalition further please get in touch.
March 2010
Over 60 organisations and individuals have now signed-up to the SCAR pledge. Over the past few months we have been involved in a number of events and received a number of contacts requesting further information. The SCAR Working Group will shortly be organising consultation with its supporters to explore how SCAR can move forward in the future. Further details will be sent out in the near future. If you would like to get involved please contact us by sending a message from our contacts page.
January 2010
On 27th January 2010 SCAR worked in partnership with Salisbury City Council to stage an event for Holocaust Memorial Day 2010. The event remembered the victims of the Holocaust on the 65th anniversary of the liberation of Auswitz. This years theme was "The Legacy of Hope". We were able to honour those from different communities who suffered 65 years ago as well as celebrating the fact that our community today is very diverse in nature. To illustrate this we were able to display the "Love Thy Neighbour" photographic exhibtion at the Guildhall in Salisbury during the event.
September 2009
SCAR has now been about since the begining of this year. We have displayed the photogrpahic exhibition at the Guildhall and the City Hall in Salisbury during that time as well as distributing the beer mats and posters.
Photographic Exhibition - "Love Thy Neighbour" - On the 18th September 2009 Salisbury District Hopsital has agreed to display the "Love Thy Neighbour" photographic exhibition for one month until the 18th October 2009. Details of the location in the Hospital will be circulated later. This will give many people an open opportunity to view the photographs.
On the 19th until 24th October 2009 - the exhibition will be at the Civic Hall in Trowbridge where two events are taking place linked with Black History month:
1. 19th October for 7 days "We Were There" - The We Were There Exhibition highlights the significant but little know contribution made by Britain's ethnic minotities to defence over the past two hundred and fifty years.
2. Black History Month Celebrations - Saturday 24th October 2009 - Annual celebration with stalls etc
Further details of these events are available from Heather Patrick of Wiltshire Council.
Celebration Evening - Friday 25th September 2009 - Salisbury Playhouse - 5.45pm till 8.00pm. This event will be by invitation only. The evening is a celebration of the work of SCAR so far. Certificates will be presented to those who have been the subject of the Photographs in th exhibition and to the organisations/individuals who have signed up to SCAR. Please put this date in your diary as it would be good to see as many of you as possible.
SCAR Conference - "Salisbury Says NO to racism! - So what next?" - Monday 5th October 2009 - 10.00am till 4.00pm - Guest Speaker: Mrs Doreen Lawrence - The conference is sponsored by Wiltshire Fire & Rescue Service and Wiltshire Council - The aim of the conference is to look at Race Hate Crime in the County and discuss ways of expanding the SCAR project across Wiltshire and to include other Hate Crime. As well as hearing from Mrs Lawrence there will also be an opportunity to view "The Pride, The Prejudice" a DVD comissioned by Devon Race Equality Council on the subject of descrimination experienced by the Romany community. The conference will be open to all those signed-up to SCAR, all groups working on Hate Crime across Wiltshire from statutory, voluntary, business or community sectors. If you know of anyone who can contribute to the debate please let them know about this conference. We will be circulating a flyer within the next few days.
As you can see the next few months are quite busy so we are looking for your support to make these events a success.
If you require further details or would like to register and interest at attending the events or even helping out!! please contact us through the enquiry page.
June 2009
The SCAR photographic exhibition has now been on display at two events, once on the 7th February 2009 in the Guildhall and then on 5th May 2009 at the City Hall in Salisbury. On both occasions this generated a lot of interest and new organisations signed up to SCAR.
The organisers have been looking for new ways of taking SCAR forward to combat racism and Salisbury District Hospital has agreed to host the "Love Thy Neighbour" Exhibtion from 18th September to the 18th October 2009. Details of this are being worked on at the moment and will be posted on the website in due course.
It is hope that there will be a number of other events organised by SCAR during this period to encourage people to sign up and also to think about how we can move this initiative forward. We invite anyone with ideas to come forward and help us out.
SCAR is aware of a number of events being organised within Black History Month - October - and details of these will be posted on the website when full details are known.
"Love Thy Neighbour" - 7th February 2009
On Saturday 7th February Salisbury Guildhall was home to 'Love Thy
Neighbour', a photographic exhibition celebrating the diversity of the
local population. It was organised by Salisbury Coalition Against
Racism (SCAR), a project sponsored by Wiltshire Churches Together and
supported by a grant from Salisbury District Council. SCAR aims to
affirm Salisbury as a welcoming city for people of all ethnicities and
nationalities, believing that racist and xenophobic attitudes and
attacks scar the community and wishing to stand together with other
organisations to oppose them and promote peaceful community relations.
Posters and beer-mats are being circulated around the city bearing the
words 'Salisbury says NO to racism' and '"I'm not racist but... " what
comes next is!' Many organisations are signing up to the coalition,
ranging from Salisbury NHS Trust and the Army to Salisbury Playhouse and
Sarum College.
Fiona Hulbert, Social Responsibility Officer and SCAR co-ordinator, says
'Many people think Salisbury is not a very diverse area, but this
exhibition has highlighted that people from many different countries and
backgrounds have made their home here. We want to help everyone value
that diversity and think about what life might be like for minorities
living among us - sadly neither our city or our churches are always as
welcoming as we might like to think'.