Holiday helpers required

We are in need of helpers for our one-week UK holiday in Babbacombe (Torquay, Devon) in July/August.

We have a waiting list of disabled guests keen to join this popular holiday, but we won't be able to offer them a place unless we get more helpers.

If you would be interested in helping, please contact Margaret at the office as soon as possible, for further information.

Jenny on Premier Radio!

Our DCF Coordinator, Jenny Edwards, appeared on Torch Trust's Insight programme on Sunday 7th February at 4.00pm

Insight is a weekly radio programme with a focus on disability and faith, presented by Marilyn Baker.

For more information about the Insight programme, and to learn a little more about Jenny, please follow this link.

Leaving a Legacy to TTR

Do you have the Will to change the Future?

Do consider leaving a bequest to Through the Roof in your Will. A bequest to Through the Roof also includes the work of Disabled Christians Fellowship and Wheels for the World.

Why write a Will?

We all need to be good stewards of our money and thinking ahead about our Will is one way of doing that.

No Will - no choice

If you don’t make a Will, statutory rules will determine what happens to your possessions. This may not be in accord with your wishes or expectations.

Ensure the right people benefit

The nearest member of your family will not necessarily inherit your estate. If you are married and have other family, your spouse will not automatically receive everything.

Inheritance Tax

A gift to charity will be deducted from your estate before the calculation of inheritance tax.

Have a say in the future

By leaving a legacy to Through the Roof, you will be investing in the future and helping to make a hopeless future into a positive one. What your solicitor will need to know:

The value and nature of your possessions
Your choice of executors
What you want to leave to whom

Leaving a legacy to Through the Roof will change lives.

What if I have already made my Will?

If you would like to leave a legacy to Through the Roof but have already written your Will, it’s still easy to do. You can add a codicil (which is a further document making a change or addition to a Will) which means you don’t have to rewrite your whole Will. We suggest that you contact a solicitor for advice.

Here’s an example of how to word a codicil:

“By this codicil to my last Will, I give to Through the Roof, Alpha House, Alpha Place, Garth Road, Morden, Surrey, SM4 4TQ registered charity number 1087788, (insert (a) or (b) as appropriate):

(a) the sum of £ (in figures) £ (in words)

(b) (a clear description of the relevant item of property e.g. ‘all of my silver jewellery excluding my rings’)

for its general purposes and I direct that the receipt of the Director of Finance or other duly authorised officer shall be a sufficient discharge to my executors.”

The codicil will need to be signed, dated and witnessed in the same way as your Will.

My Pledge of a legacy to Through the Roof

If you have decided to remember us in your Will, please would you tell us? We would love to thank you for your generosity, which will make a positive difference to the lives of disabled people

Thank you

By remembering Through the Roof in your Will you’ll help us achieve many things…

* You’ll help us improve the quality of life of thousands of disabled people in the UK and overseas through our support networks.
* You’ll be bringing hope to those who are often without hope as we equip churches to bring the Gospel to disabled people.
* Your legacy will mean that disabled children in developing countries may play with non-disabled children for the first time ever.
* You’ll bring mobility to hundreds of people who, without wheelchairs, will spend the rest of their lives on their hands and knees.
* You’ll enable us to help hundreds of Churches to better understand the needs of disabled Christians in the UK.

There are two main ways you can help Through the Roof in your will:

1. By making a pecuniary gift

This is a fixed amount of money. Over time, these gifts are likely to decrease in value due to inflation. Ask your solicitor about index linking your gift to protect its value.

This is an example of how to word such a pecuniary gift for a fixed amount of money:

“I give to Through the Roof of Unit B1, Aviary Court, 138 Miles Road, Epsom KT19 9AB, Registered Charity number 1087788, the sum of £ (in figures) £ (in words) for its general purposes and I direct that the receipt of the Director of Finance or other duly authorised officer shall be a sufficient discharge to my executors.”

2. By making a residuary gift

This is a gift made from the remainder of your estate after other gifts have been made and debts and taxes have been deducted.

For example:

“I give all (or a share of to be specified) the residue of my estate after payment of all my debts, funeral and testamentary expenses, to Through the Roof of Unit B1, Aviary Court, 138 Miles Road, Epsom KT19 9AB registered charity number 1087788, for its general purposes and I direct that the receipt of the Director of Finance or other duly authorised officer shall be a sufficient discharge to my executors.”

Your legacy to Through the Roof will change lives.

Through the Roof

P O Box 353

EPSOM

KT18 5WS

Phone: 01372 749955

Fax: 01372 737040

ASNA Conference

Recently Through the Roof were invited to present at the annual conference of the Adventist Special Needs Association in the West Midlands – please follow this link for more information about this inspirational day.
http://www.asna.info/training-conference-2009

Caring for our Family

Care for the Family invited Through the Roof to exhibit at their conference in Northern Ireland and so Tim Wood travelled there to support and encourage TTR’s small team of volunteers in the Province, to raise awareness of the charity.

[Picture - John Brown presents materials at the Care for the Family conference]

Committed volunteers, Carol, John and new recruit Mary, along with Tim were able to speak to many interested delegates about the charity’s work and it is hoped the day will result in an increased number of speaking engagements as well as potential new volunteers to assist the current team-members. Conversations included John’s experiences in church, an Occupational Therapist’s interest in a Wheels trip as well as the need for practical assistance taking children’s wheelchairs to their storage container.

Tim benefited from the excellent Irish hospitality and a visit to the recently refurbished Orangefield church in Belfast, where they are committed to addressing the needs of disabled people as an integral part of all their activities. In the near future we will feature the activities of churches like Orangefield on our website pages to encourage other churches on their journey of inclusion.

Tim learned that the team travel widely to churches to speak about the work and encourage the inclusion of disabled people. They are also adept at collecting children’s wheelchairs for the charity’s Wheels for the World programme and have a designated storage container based in Hillsborough. It is hoped that new volunteers can assist with the work and a briefing day would be planned to support any new recruits.

If you have a spare hour or two and could get involved, please contact Northern Ireland Co-ordinator, Carol – 028 9094 7910

Wheels 4 Haiti

Following January’s terrible earthquake in Haiti, Through the Roof has set up a special fund for future work there, called ‘Wheels 4 Haiti’.

Much of the initial giving to Haiti is for alleviating the immediate crisis. Even as the story falls away from the headlines, and the wreckage starts to be cleared, the longterm problem remains huge, and with so many leg injuries there is going to be an ongoing need for wheelchairs and for medical professionals to assist in fitting and advice. Through the Roof is fully equipped to contribute through our Wheels for the World programme. We recycle wheelchairs that would have been discarded, and have them refurbished to a very high standard at a prison. We then distribute them with expert medical and technical support to assist in fitting.

However, to deliver to Haiti we need funding. Our target is to raise £10,000 to cover the cost of one distribution to Haiti (200 chairs) and if we raise more than this we can help with volunteer personal costs and more or larger distributions.

The project will be launched with a special event in Epsom on the 26th March, featuring guest speaker, Chris Grayling, MP for Epsom & Ewell and Shadow Home Secretary. We’ll be running more events and raising awareness over the next few months to help create these funds, but we welcome your support and ideas for this programme and all our work.

Specific giving guarantees specific delivery of help for this specific need in Haiti.

Follow this link to donate directly to Wheels 4 Haiti

- this link uses www.justgiving.com

Capetown 2010

We are delighted to announce that Through the Roof is privileged to be represented at the historic Capetown 2010 event. Our chief executive, Jacky Oliver, has been selected as one of only 70 people to be invited from the UK. More importantly this is about ensuring that the inclusive language does indeed mean everyone, including those of us who live with some form of disability.

Cape Town 2010, held in collaboration with the World Evangelical Alliance, will bring together 4,000 leaders from more than 200 countries to confront how the critical issues of our time – other world faiths, poverty, HIV/AIDS and persecution, among others - relate to the future of the Church and world evangelization.

Thousands more leaders will participate in the discussion on the issues through the Lausanne Global Conversation and at remote Congress sites through the Cape Town GlobaLink.

Learn more

You can assist us in this by

Offering to be part of a prayer network for Jacky
Log onto Global link and keep involved with the discussion
Log onto our website for updates and to give us your comments

Find a DCF Group

Here's a list of DCF Groups through the UK -- Please email the Through the Roof office or phone on 01372 749955 to be put in touch with one.

We've included postcodes to hopefully give a good idea of the location of the group. Contact us for more details.

Birmingham (Haymills and Yardley) - B25
Croydon - CR2
Fylde Coast (Thornton Cleveleys & Blackpool) - FY5
Ipswich - IP4
Malvern - WR14
Norwich - NR7
Sidcup - DA14
Taw & Torridge - EX31
Worthing - BN13

The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA)

The Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (DDA) is legislation that was implemented with the aim of ending discrimination towards disabled people in terms of services, employment, education etc.

Does this apply to my church?

It certainly does! As service providers, churches have the following obligations:

Not to treat disabled people 'less favourably' for a reason related to their disability - for example, a church should not tell a family not to bring their child with learning disabilities as the child shouts out at inappropriate times. The church should work with the parents to find a solution together.

To make ‘reasonable adjustments’ for disabled people, such as providing extra help or making changes to the way the church provides its services (whether these be worship services, house groups, social events, weddings, funerals etc). An example might be to provide large print versions of songs projected onto screen, to help people with sight loss or people who cannot stand to worship. Reasonable adjustments also involves the provision of equipment such as an induction loop system for hearing aid users.

To make 'reasonable adjustments' to physical features to overcome physical barriers for disabled people - for example, by providing ramps where there are steps or providing a wheelchair accessible toilet.

How can we get more help on how the Act affects our church?

A useful publication is the Code of Practice: Rights of Access, Goods, Facilities, Services and Premises. This is published by the Stationary Office, ISBN 0-11-702860-6, and can be ordered from any good bookshop.

What support can TTR provide?

We have produced a pack called 'Removing Barriers' which is a self-assessment resource/questionnaire enabling churches to check a set of measures to see how inclusive their services, activities and programmes are for disabled people.

To order your copy of Removing Barriers, and to see our other useful publications, please go to our online shop.

Churches for All

Through the Roof is a member of Churches for All, a partnership of UK Christian disability organisations aiming to challenge and enable churches to fully include disabled people.

Visit the CFA website for more information of each respective partner organisation and details of their specific resources which could assist: www.churchesforall.org.uk

Partner organisations include:

Causeway Prospects - resources for people with learning disabilities
Torch Trust - literature and fellowship for people with sight loss
Go! Sign - supporting and enabling Deaf Christians
Livability - care, housing and education for disabled people
Open Ears - fellowship for hard of hearing Christians
ASNA - Adventist Special Needs Association - support for disabled people and families