It is my pleasure to be the first lady President of Southport Rotary, now in its 98th Year since chartering on 13th December 1922. As a vibrant and busy Club we are looking forward to our Centenary and developing our Club to be available to all members of the community. To carry on our valuable work we need to engage with a wider and younger membership and we believe our recent partnership working with the Eco Centre will give us the opportunity to do this.

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Over the years Rotary has developed areas of focus for its members to assist. This year has seen a new and very important additional area of focus - "our environment". Rotary clubs work in and for the community all over the world, as part of a very large and influential organisation holding the highest consultative status offered to a non-governmental organisation by the United Nations economic and social councils. Over the last five years, 18 million dollars has been spent on environmental issues, donated by Rotarians in 200 countries by 1.2 million members across the world. In July 2021 new grants will be available.

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The mission of our Club is strong and ambitious but achievable, continuing to work with the Eco Centre. We want to lead by example, be one of the first to play a big part in this work in our area and draw in other Rotary Clubs and organisations to create a network of  partners, local authorities, schools and businesses to support learning and application of how we can all play a part, change our habits now and take responsibility for what we do. Together we can make a difference, have fun, meet new friends and bring about a lasting plan to improve and change our environment for future generations.

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We are working with the Eco Centre to support, provide and recognise training and education within schools and the wider community so that we all improve our carbon footprint. We are people of action who care about our world and want to make it a better place. Over the last 7 months we have met regularly on Zoom with Darren, Julie and Anne-Marie. We have come to understand and see all the hard work they do with local schools and schools across Sefton and much more. I hope when the Eco Centre re-opens that we can all make a visit to see what they do first-hand and help to develop, grow and support their work now and in the future. It is a true gem within our town.

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The co-vid 19 Lockdown has been very hard for everyone, especially children at school and their teachers and the lack of contact across the family in general has taken its toll on us all. Behind the scenes we have been able to work on initiatives for the future. Our initial aims are to support the very valuable work done within schools with additional resources and more.

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We also have a remit to bring the community together as a whole, but especially for older people to understand, support and demonstrate how they can work with us to improve the environment in a number of ways.  We have initially started this process with our own Club members completing our Environmental Audit and we wish to invite other organisations to join us in our quest. Organisations across the town are invited to contact us and help us make a difference by joining in our audit.