£850,000 boost for Salvation Army care service

THE future of the much-valued Salvation Army Community Care Service has been secured, thanks to a six-figure legacy from a Forfar man.

Retired architect Robert Saddler, a service user of the project for some time, died two years ago leaving £850,000 in his will to the service which helped care for him.

Born in the town, he moved to Edinburgh where he worked for many years at what was then the UK Government’s Ministry of Works.

He became a senior architect at the Post Office in the 1960s and also worked on Edinburgh’s Royal Botanic Gardens, St George’s Church in Charlotte Street and was the architect responsible for Waverley Telephone Exchange, among other projects in the capital, before retiring to his holiday home in St James’s Road.

God-sent

Announcing details of the legacy last Friday Major Jim McCluskey, team leader of Community Care Service (Angus), described the £850,000 windfall as a “God-sent legacy” which has secured the future of the service.

He revealed details of the financial predicament facing the service, set up 13 years ago with a £1m legacy from Dundee couple Archie and Ina Briggs, which is run in conjunction with Angus Council’s Social Work & Health Department.

It provides a vital lifeline for older people living in the Angus area with project workers organising weekly grocery shopping, pension collections, bill payments and co-ordination of medical prescriptions for vulnerable clients.

Major McCluskey said: “We have been thrown a lifeline with this legacy. It’s truly a God-send. We will now be able to secure the future of this project for many years.

“We are extremely grateful to Robert. Like all our service users, we valued him as a person. He was not just a name on a list of visits but someone we cared for.

“It couldn’t have come at a better, or a worse time given the situation financially for everybody. We are not shielded from that.

“The money came at the right time for us because, financially, we really were in quite a serious situation.

“Lack of finance was going to mean we would have to look very, very seriously about our operations.”

Whilst the service receives annual funding from Angus Council, the Briggs’ legacy has been used through the years to fund the deficit – and it was this initial money which had all but run out.

Last penny

Major McCluskey continued: “That legacy has kept us going for the last 13 years. It came to the point that we were, quite literally, almost down to our last penny. We were looking at funding for the next year, and where that funding was going to come from.

“We were having to ask some very serious questions. On the same day we were going to discuss what we were going to do in the future, we discovered this money had been left to us.

“It guarantees the future of the community care service for many years to come. It gives us the opportunity to look at what we are doing and to discover if there are other things we could do which could benefit the people of Angus and remain faithful to the sentiments that are expressed in the leaving of such an amount of money to an organisation like ourselves.

“As well as being very grateful, I personally feel very humbled that somebody could place as much faith in us as Mr Saddler obviously has done.

“So we look forward to the future, in partnership with Angus Council’s Social Work Department, and we really are looking forward to the future now both in terms of having secure funding and also to the opportunities which a legacy such as this will give us.”

Other services

Major McCluskey added this legacy would now give the Salvation Army the opportunity to look at the possibility of providing other services for the benefit of the people of Angus.

“For me this is one of the positive issues of this legacy.

“Without legacy money, we wouldn’t exist. The ‘memorial’ to Mr Saddler will be the fact the service will continue and I think that, probably, is the most important memorial that we could establish to Mr Saddler.

“It’s in his name that this service will continue, whereas in the past 13 years it has been in the name of Archie and Ina Briggs, although we will never forget their contribution to the service. That mantle now falls on to Mr Robert Saddler.”

Major Martin Hill, the Salvation Army’s North Scotland Divisional Commander, was “particularly pleased” Mr Saddler had recognised the care he had been given by the service through the legacy.

He said: “The Salvation Army relies heavily on the generosity of the public to support our work, especially in these difficult economic times.

“We would also like to thank Angus Council for their continued commitment.

“Many people will benefit from Mr Saddler’s kindness; we will now be able to look at various needs of older people in the Angus area.”

Jerry Forteath, service manager for Angus Council’s community care, also welcomed news of the legacy.

He said: “Angus Council works in partnership with a number of organisations to deliver community care services, and particularly with the Salvation Army in providing a really valuable shopping service to older people in Angus.

“We are delighted to work with the Salvation Army and recognise the value of that service to vulnerable people, and the other work they do in the community.”

Captain Elizabeth Hayward, community services officer based at the Salvation Army’s London head-quarters, explained the Angus service was already recognised as a “flagship” programme throughout the country.

“It also offers valuable learning for other places in the country that are running similar types of services but haven’t had the opportunity to offer more diverse ways of delivering the service. This is a huge and very valuable opportunity for us.”