The Wales-office of one of the UK’s largest full-service law firms is ‘busy organising dozens of events’ after choosing Wales Air Ambulance as its Charity partner for 2024-2026.
Staff at Blake Morgan’s head office in Cardiff were given the opportunity to nominate a new office charity they would like to fundraise for over a 2-year period from May 2024 – April 2026.
The vote was ‘unanimous’ in favour of the lifesaving service, according to co-Chairs of the firm’s Cardiff office, Corporate Social Responsibility Committee.
The Chairs noted that one of the firm’s members nominated Wales Air Ambulance as the office charity of the year because it assisted one of their family members. The service was a great help to them and their family.
They said: “The whole team fully got behind the nomination because of the personal experience that was shared. It moved them. Everyone, more generally knew about the work of the service, how it saves lives daily, and felt it was important to support the cause.”
Wales Air Ambulance is consultant-led, taking hospital-standard treatments to the patient and, if required, transferring them directly to the most appropriate hospital for their illness or injury. For the patient, this can mean hours saved when compared to standard care and is proven to greatly improve survival and early recovery.
This advanced critical care includes the ability to administer anaesthesia, deliver blood transfusions and conduct minor operations, all at the scene of an incident.
As a pan-Wales service, its dedicated crews, regardless of where they are based, will travel the length and breadth of the country to deliver emergency lifesaving care.
The chairs added: “Wales Air Ambulance is such a well-known charity, but it was not until we started the Charity partnership, that we got to fully understand the extent of what the service does.
They said: “In the early meetings we got to meet a clinician and a past patient, who explained their stories. It is groundbreaking really the work that is done.
“It shocked us to find out that, open-heart surgery has been performed in a back garden in Wales, that level of critical care is extraordinary. The air ambulance is an A and E department by air and on wheels, and that surprised our team.
“It has been inspiring for us all to learn more about what the service does. A lot of the members who attended the session with the past patient said they had not realised the type of critical care that is provided at the scene.
“I think the clinician, took everyone’s breath away, sharing some of his experiences. They deal with such catastrophic events and just continue to keep doing it. They go to the next one and the next one, it is just amazing how they do it!”
The Charity talk got members of Blake Morgan’s C.R. Committee thinking about their fundraising target and the types of events they wanted to create to support the lifesaving service.
They said: “Some people are very active in our team, so they want to do challenges and sporting events, then there are others who are more comfortable organising events such as bake sales, sweepstakes or raffles.
“We have spent the past few months harnessing everyone’s strengths and bringing the ideas together, to create something that all our employees can get involved with.”
And added: “We are preparing for our Taff Trail Walk in June. Over twenty-six people have signed up so far.
“Our colleague Kaya is doing two runs, the Swansea Half-Marathon in May and Newtown 10K in June. She is kindly donating all the money to our fundraiser.
“We also have Wimbledon, Women’s Euros and Women’s Rugby World Cup Sweep Stakes, there isn’t much organisation involved in getting them together, but we will get really good engagement.”
This autumn, the team will also be organising a quiz in September, a few team members will be taking part in the Cardiff-Half, then there will be Halloween, Movember, and several Christmas events.
Abi Pearce, Corporate Partnerships Manager, said: “We are hugely appreciative of Blake Morgan’s team effort to raise as much awareness and money as they can for our lifesaving service.
“Just scrolling through the list of events, you can see their diary for 2025 is already full.
“Our partnership has developed from that initial first meeting, to the day the staff met one of our clinicians and a past patient.
“It’s inspirational to see how far our supporters are willing to go to help fundraise for our Charity, and how passionate they become about the work we do.”
