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Winter Provision Back On

From Monday, Jan 30th we have been operating Winter Provision, with other homeless agencies in the city, as overnight temperatures were forecast to be freezing or below for 3 consecutive nights.  This entails re-opening at 7pm to allow 9 rough sleepers back into the centre for a ‘bed’ space overnight.  Winter Provision is paid for by local councils to ensure rough sleepers who want to come in, during periods of extreme cold, have access to ‘bed’ spaces.

Posted on 31 Jan, 2012 - 02:09 PM

Project Petrock

Do you need any house or garden maintenance/improvement work done?  Project Petrock is ready for your call.  Guided by Matt Tandy, a local builder with many years’ experience, clients volunteer with the project and receive on-the-job training.  Many of our volunteers are already skilled and experienced trades people who just need to refresh their skills.  For a free, no obligation estimate, please contact Matt at Project Petrock on 01392 848713 or 07956 104354 and help start transforming lives today!

Posted on 03 Jan, 2012 - 04:14 PM

Christmas Street Collection

This year’s Street Collection in Exeter raised £793.28. Our thanks to Vineyard Church for their amazing collectors and choir, to the Exeter uni SIFE students who turned up on the day, as well as our regular crew of supporters and Nellie, the Jack Russell dressed as Santa’s Little Helper for making a very busy Saturday such a success!

Posted on 21 Dec, 2011 - 02:39 PM

Collaborative Bid Win!

As part of a collaborative bid with other Exeter agencies,  St Petrock’s has been successfully awarded £250,000 to adopt ‘No Second Night Out’ – an initiative that aims to ensure that anyone who ends up on the streets gets helped quickly so they don’t spend a second night out.
The grant is part of an £8m pot being awarded by the Homelessness Transition Fund to 41 projects nationwide that aim to help ensure that no one lives on our streets.  Administered by umbrella organisation, Homeless Link, the Fund received 190 applications from charities wanting to protect key homelessness services and adopt initiatives like ‘No Second Night Out’.
 
Project manager for St Petrock’s, Mel Hartley, said,” We are delighted to have been awarded this grant on behalf of the collaboration, especially at a time when Exeter has shown a rise in rough sleeping.
“With the co-operation and co-ordination of all agencies involved in this project, we will focus moving new rough sleepers quickly off the streets and into accommodation and tackling the highly complex needs of those remain in a cycle of long-term rough sleeping.”

Posted on 21 Dec, 2011 - 02:38 PM

Provident Financial’s Charity Walk

Staff and managers from Provident Financial’s Exeter office completed an 8 mile charity walk along Exeter Canal in October and raised an amazing £1725!  Our grateful thanks to all those who took part and to all those who provided the sponsorship.

Posted on 13 Dec, 2011 - 03:00 PM

Christmas Opening Hours

As normal, St Petrock’s will be open from 9am to 1pm on Christmas and Boxing Day for breakfast and festive lunches.  This year, clients have decorated the centre using their own handmade decorations as well as those that have been donated.  Thank you to everyone who has made a donation and please note that we will be closed on Tuesday, December 27th and Monday, January 2nd. We’d like to wish you all a Merry Christmas!

Posted on 13 Dec, 2011 - 12:15 PM

Our Christmas Cards are on sale in St Martin’s!

Our Christmas cards will be on sale in St Martin’s shop (only) on Cathedral Green from tomorrow, Wed Nov 2nd.  This year’s selection features a spectacular card of the Cathedral by local artist, Joan Wolkers,  as well as four fabulous designs by clients and staff.  Cards are sold in packs of 10 for £3.50.

Posted on 01 Nov, 2011 - 12:02 PM

Urgent Items Required

As the threat of cold weather approaches, we would be very grateful for any donations of sleeping bags and vacuum flasks.  If you can’t deliver them, please call Gill on 422396 and if you can, please remember access into Cathedral Yard is only until 10am.  St Petrock’s is open weekdays 8.30am - 4pm.

Posted on 01 Nov, 2011 - 11:56 AM

Local Donations

Our thanks to Tuckers Arms Raft Club at Dalwood, near Axminster, for their donation of £1,000 which they raised mainly hiring out their marquees to local events and private functions.  We are also grateful to the Yorkshire & Chelsea Building Society’s Charitable Foundation for their donation of £1,000 in support of our work.  Local donations, of all amounts, are vital in enabling us to provide our emergency services and we are very fortunate to have such strong, local support - so thank you all.

Posted on 28 Oct, 2011 - 09:48 AM

Christmas Street Collection

We will be holding this year’s Christmas Street Collection in Exeter on Saturday, December 10th from 10am to 3pm and if you would like to help us collect fro an hour or so, on the day, please contact .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Posted on 28 Oct, 2011 - 09:21 AM

Full Quota of Volunteers

All would-be volunteers, please note we are currently in the happy position to have a full quota of great volunteers helping out in our kitchen so we are not recruiting volunteers for the time being.  This situation will change and we will announce this as and when.  We should also mention that we do not take on kitchen volunteers specifically for the Christmas period, as this is covered by current volunteers.

Posted on 26 Oct, 2011 - 09:22 AM

Thank You Phil and Andy

We would like to say a huge ‘thank you’ to Phil Sims and Andy Murray from Howet Alcoa who, again this year,  provided superb support as collectors of Harvest Festival donations.  For a whole week, Phil and Andy drove a hired van around East and Mid Devon collecting vast amount of dry, packaged food and toiletries from schools and churches and delivering them to us in Cathedral Yard.  With the help of our wonderful team of client volunteers, lead by Steve, these were then ferried down into our storage area in the crypt.  While we hope to thank all of our supporters for their donations inidividually, we would also like to thank all of you who donated Harvest Festival items to us here, as once again, we have been reminded of people’s enormous generosity.  Thank you all.

Posted on 18 Oct, 2011 - 09:03 AM

Vineyard’s Supper

Vineyard Church put on an amazing dinner for our volunteers and staff at St Petrock’s on Sept 15th, transforming the centre with uplights and a beautiful table display.  We would like to thank everyone from Vineyardwho took part in providing us with such a special evening.

Posted on 28 Sep, 2011 - 10:52 AM

Harvest Festival Deliveries

Just a reminder that access into Cathedral Yard for deliveries to us can only be made between 8.30am - 10am weekdays.  If you would like your Harvest Festival donation collected please call Gill on 01392 422396 as we are very fortunate, again this year, to have the kind services of a driver and van from Alcoa Howet for a week, from Monday, October 10th.  Could we also remind supporters that we are unable to accept any more apples or marrows as we have been inundated!  Thank you.

Posted on 28 Sep, 2011 - 10:22 AM

New Post for Project Petrock

Thanks to Provident Financial Group’s Good Neighbour Scheme, Project Petrock can now recruit a trainer to help people who are homeless re-train and gather valuable work experience in house/garden maintenance and repair, following an award of 60k over three years. “This is great news for us”, says Keith Johnson, Development Manager for the Project Petrock,“having got Project Petrock off the ground, we soon realised that there was far too much work for a volunteer to commit to, now that we can employ someone to run the business and supervise on-the-job training means we can really get going!  If you are interested in this 28hr a week position with Project Petrock, a full job application pack can be found here.  Please note the closing date for this position is noon Monday, October 10th and applications should be sent for the attention of Keith Johnson or by email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Posted on 22 Sep, 2011 - 11:40 AM

Thank You Topsham

Our grateful thanks to both Mary Grynier and Ann MacMenamin for respectively organising two, very successful, fund raising events this summer - the Flower Festival at St Margaret’s Church and the Tophsam Street Collection in aid of St Petrock’s.  The Flower Festival in July raised £1050 for St Petrock’s and the Street Collection on August 22nd raised a further £647.37.  We are very fortunate to benefit from the generosity of visitors and residents alike in Topsham and would like to thank all those that took part for their continued support and hard work.

Posted on 30 Aug, 2011 - 09:22 AM

Accommodation Advisor Post

We have an exciting job opportunity, based at HMP Exeter, as an Accommodation Advisor who will assist our team in helping provide solutions to a variety of accommodation and support based needs which will work towards enabling successful reintegration into the community.  For a full job description please click here.  An application form can be downloaded here.  Please note the closing date for this position is Monday, September 12th and applications should be sent for the attention of Gill Luckings or by email .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).

Posted on 10 Aug, 2011 - 08:27 AM

Design A Christmas Card?

If anyone would like to put forward a design that we could use as one of our Christmas cards this year, then we would like to hear from you.  The brief is totally open, all we would ask is that you contact us by September 2nd if you would like to be involved.  Please telephone 422396 or use the Contact webpage.

Posted on 02 Aug, 2011 - 01:26 PM

National Increase In Homelessness

Government data released in June shows that 26,400 people approached a local council for housing help in the first three months of 2011, a rise of 23% compared with the same period last year.  Some areas of the country have seen rises of 50% in applications.  Less than half of these applications (43%) were successful, which is the lowest acceptance rate since 1999.  Another worrying statistic is that the proportion of households found to be homeless but “not in priority need” continues to increase from 15% in 2008 - to 21% in the first quarter of 2011. 

 

 

Posted on 24 Jun, 2011 - 01:06 PM

New Course

We will be offering clients a new accredited course this autumn - Skills for Career and Life Enhancement - which will cover a variety of units allowing learners to combine units into an Open College Network Certificate or Award.  Units have been selected to cover the main ‘soft’ skills areas of personal development, personal responsibility, motivation and personal care as well as vocational areas such as IT and work preparedness. As with all our courses, SCALE will also be open to other agencies’ clients upon referral.  Please contact .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) for further details.

Posted on 24 Jun, 2011 - 12:43 PM

Most Wanted Items

If you have any spare men’s underwear or unused toothbrushes - we would really appreciate them.  Also please see our Harvest Festival ‘Most Wanted’ list by clicking on How You Can Helpb at the top of the page.

Posted on 08 Jun, 2011 - 09:54 AM

Personal Development Course

In response to our clients for a nationally recognised certificated course, Keith, our Basic Skills Tutor, has written a Developing Personal Development Skills course and made it part of the NOCN Progression qualifications.  This course is about helping people take control of the way they are in the world.  The course does not aim to change people’s lives but to provide some of the skills they need to make changes they personally want to make and how to deal with making those changes - the set-backs and the successes.  It will form one unit of a larger NOCN approved qualification, called Skills for Career and Lilfe Enhancement (SCALE), which will also include units in Preparing for Work, Skills for Gaining Employment, Personal Budgetting, IT, Cooking Skills and more. This course is open to referrals from other agencies.

Posted on 02 Jun, 2011 - 10:48 AM

New Rent & Support Service

Our latest project, St Petrock’s Rent & Support Service is now up and running. This service has been developed in partnership with Crisis and is aimed at developing access to private rented accommodation in Exeter, East and Mid Devon for those in housing need.  So far, six clients have been accommodated and receive floating support to help them create a manageable home for themselves and long-term sustainable tenancies. Our Housing Liason Officer, Shiralee, works with tenants and landlords to ensure the tenancies run smoothly.  If you are a private landlord and would be interested in discussing this project further contact Shiralee on 01392 422396.

Posted on 02 Jun, 2011 - 10:04 AM

Garden Open

As part of the National Garden Scheme, The Old Dairy in Sidbury will be open to visitors from 2-6pm on Saturday, May 14th and Sunday, May 15th, and all sundry receipts will come to St Petrock’s.  Thank you Peter!

Posted on 12 May, 2011 - 09:13 AM

NEAC Exhibition

This Year’s New English Art Club exhibition will be holding an exhibition of members’ work at The Great Barn, Higher Ashton, EX6 for four days in May in supoprt of St Petrock’s and Marie Curie.
The exhibition will be open on:
Friday, May 6th - 11am-4pm
Saturday, May 7th - 11am-5pm
Sunday, May 8th - 11am - 5pm
Monday, May 9th - 10am - 2pm

Admission is free and a painting will be raffled and drawn on Monday, May 9th.  Raffle tickets will cost £10 per ticket.
All welcome!

Posted on 22 Apr, 2011 - 10:21 AM

Wilkinson’s

Wilkinson’s new store in The Guildhall recently presented Linda, our Kitchen manager, with £250 worth of vouchers as part of their corporate charity

Posted on 22 Apr, 2011 - 10:10 AM

DCC grant

We would also like to thank Devon County Council for its grant of £800 to upgrade our very old fridges/ freezers and other kitchen equipment which had lead very long lives!

Posted on 22 Apr, 2011 - 10:07 AM

Topsham Bridge Event

Thank you to all those who attended the Topsham Bridge Event which raised an amazing £1086 plus Gift Aid!

Posted on 22 Apr, 2011 - 10:04 AM

Socks please

If you have any mens’ socks that you are able to donate we would be very grateful for them, especially those suitable for warmer weather. Our stocks are now very low and keeping feet dry can be a real problem for our clients so please rummage through those drawers!  Thank you.

Posted on 16 Mar, 2011 - 03:59 PM

Launch of Project Petrock

Our new social enterprise, Project Petrock, is now up and running.  Project Petrock aims to fill a gap in services for Exeter residents and businesses as well as provide vital on-the-job training for people who are, or have recently been, homeless.  Keith, our Development Manager, explains “Project Petrock will provide house and garden maintenance and repair services to private households and businesses in Exeter and surrounding areas.”  John Sheridan, a local entrepreneur with 30 years experience, will oversee all work carried out and provide on-site training to our client volunteers.  John says “We see Project petrock as filling a useful gap in the community as many ‘handymen’ are unable to take on the smaller jobs and these can make big difference to people’s lives.”  Project Petrock is a social enterpeise with a difference, not only will it be competing for work in the open market rather than relying on grants and statutory funding but it plans to train its volunteers to become co-operative memners, employees and, eventually, the owners and managers of the business as it develops.
If you have rooms or gardens that need repair, renovation or restoration, Project Petrock will be happy to provide a free, no obligations estimate - just call 01392 848713 and help Project Petrock start transforming lives today.

Posted on 04 Mar, 2011 - 01:41 PM

WAW

Following the success of last year’s Wild Art Week, we are once again working with leading arts organisations in Exeter to bring another Wild Art Week.  The week is aimed at people who would be unlikely to usually access arts events in the city; namely our clients and help encourage and make it easier for them to do so. This year’s events will take place in art spaces around the city centre - no referral is necessary but places must be booked.  Our Diary gives details of each day’s events and places can be booked by contacting .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or calling 01392 422396.

Posted on 04 Mar, 2011 - 12:50 PM

Annual Report

Our latest Annual Report is now available.  Please click here to download a copy, or alternatively you can read the Report as an on-line magazine by clicking here.

Posted on 03 Feb, 2011 - 12:55 PM

Men’s jeans

If you have a spare or old (but serviceable) pair of men’s jeans with a 30”/32”/34” waist and 30”/32” leg we would be very grateful if you would consider donating them to us.  We are out of stock on these sizes and they are in much demand!

Posted on 27 Jan, 2011 - 01:02 PM

More winter Provision

We were delighted to be be able to provide overnight accommodation for some of our rough sleeper clients for a total of 25 nights leading up to Christmas, when temperatures were forecast to be zero or below for three consecutive nights. Now, at the end of January, we have just started another session of Winter Provision, supported by Exeter City Council and are opening up again at 6.30pm to allow nine clients in overnight until 7.30am while two city hostels are providing a total of ten extra ‘beds’ from 9pm to 9am.

Posted on 27 Jan, 2011 - 12:49 PM

Local donations

We were especially fortunate this Christmas to have been the chosen charity for several concerts and carol singing events in the area and we would like to thank everyone for thinnking of us and, in particular, to the Exeter Philharmonic Choir and everyone who attended their concerts in the Cathedral in mid December - they raised an amazing £2,200!

Posted on 11 Jan, 2011 - 04:33 PM

Christmas

On behalf of our clients we’d like to say a big ‘thank you’ to everyone who came to our door with donations for Christmas.  This genorosity allowed our clients to enjoy mince pies, cakes and sweets throughout the festive period as well as a delicious roast turkey on Christmas Day and several Christmas puddings.  In addition, we were very grateful to receive winter clothing and sleeping bags.

Posted on 11 Jan, 2011 - 03:49 PM

Street Collection

This year’s Street Collection in Exeter raised a record-breaking £887.36!  Thank you to everyone who supported us and our special thanks to the Exeter Uni students who did a great job turning up in numbers to collect and to the Vineyard Choir for their wonderful performance in Princesshay.

Posted on 14 Dec, 2010 - 01:08 PM

South West Chamber Choir

Our thanks to the South West Chamber Choir and Words for Voices for putting on a wonderful night’s entertainment at St Margaret’s Church in Topsham, in support of St Petrock’s, which raised £65.20 in donations.  We are especially grateful to John Green for organising the event on our behalf.

Posted on 08 Dec, 2010 - 12:53 PM

Severe Weather Provision

During this prolonged cold spell, St Petrock’s has been opening in the evenings to help accommodate rough sleepers overnight to ensure people are not at risk of dying on the streets during the cold weather.  Working with Exeter City Council, this emergency provision comes into force when the temperature is forecast to fall to zero, or below, for 3 consecutive nights and stays in place until 2 consecutive nights are forecast to be zero degrees or above.  We are delighted to have been able to offer this service to our clients.

Posted on 02 Dec, 2010 - 12:47 PM

Christmas

As normal, we will be open on Christmas and Boxing Day, serving free breakfast and a special seasonal lunch to our clients.  As we are able to staff these days with exisiting volunteers and staff, we are not able to take advantage of the number of people who contact us to volunteer over the Christmas period but would like to thank all those that come forward for thinking of us. The centre will be closed on Monday, December 27th and Monday, January 3rd.

Posted on 23 Nov, 2010 - 12:33 PM

Christmas Concerts

We are very grateful to have the support of both the South West Chamber Choir and Exeter Suzuki Group, who are putting on concerts on Sat 27th and Sun 28th November respectively, in aid of St Petrock’s.  The SW Chamber Choir’s ‘Christmas in Words and Music’ concert will be held in St Margaret’s Church Topsham at 7.3pm - tickets priced £8 and Exeter Suzuki Group’s concert of light classical music will start at 3pm in St Stephen’s Church, Exeter.

Posted on 23 Nov, 2010 - 12:27 PM

Christmas Cards

This year’s Christmas cards are on sale now in St Martin’s. We are, again, very fortunate to have local artist, Joan Wolker, produce another wonderfully atmospheric local scene for us, this time of Exeter Castle. In addition, we also have a beautiful dove design by Annette, our Art Group facilitator, which was orginally produced for Sew for Peace at Exeter Phoenix and our client volunteer John’s delightfully imaginative design of clients entering St Petrock’s.  All cards are sold in packs of 10 at £3.50 a pack. 

Posted on 27 Oct, 2010 - 10:04 AM

Trustee Mark Bate

Our Trustee, Rev’d Mark Bate will be well known to many as a local parish priest but now Mark has added a new arrow to his bow with the publication of his first novel, Owl Among The Ruins.  Launched on October 26th, at Exeter Phoenix, Owl Among The Ruins tells the story of a jaded clergyman who faces his inner demons when posted to an isolated south costal parish. It is available from http://www.amazon.co.uk.

Posted on 27 Oct, 2010 - 08:45 AM

Harvest Festival

Thank you to all our supporters for their wonderful donations from Harvest Festival, we now have a plentiful supply of tinned and packaged food as well as much-needed sleeping bags!  As we are now seeing up to 50 clients a day and often preparing 100 meals a day, with breakfast and lunch, these donations make a huge difference to our kitchen budget and allows us to spend more on other services. We would like to pay special thanks to Alcoa/Howmet for providing a van and a driver for a week to collect and deliver donations on our behalf - thank you again Andy and Phil - we hope to see you next year! 

Posted on 27 Oct, 2010 - 08:37 AM

PORCH Launch

St Petrock’s officially took over the PORCH project on Friday, October 1st.  Developed by Exeter Community Initiatives (ECI), PORCH re-houses prolific and persistent offenders in community housing and provides support in order to help
break the cycle of re-offending.  In 2009/10 PORCH supported 60 offenders and of these housed 40.  In the first quarter of this year 2010/11, PORCH has already supported 30 clients and accommodated 18. Speaking on behalf of ECI, Executive Director, Alistair Macintosh said “We are proud to have been involved in the development of the PORCH Project and what it has achieved over the past 4 years.  We are also delighted that St Petrock’s, an established local charity with an excellent reputation for supporting people to make positive change in their lives, is taking over the management of the Project. “The PORCH project is a natural extension to the services we provide,” explained Mel Hartley, Project Manager at St Petrock’s, “and we are very grateful to ECI for the very helpful and supportive way they have conducted the transition process.  PORCH has gained a considerable reputation with the Police, Probation and other city agencies and we will ensure this is maintained”.

Posted on 27 Oct, 2010 - 08:33 AM

Topsham Street Collection

This year’s Topsham Street Collection raised £641.37 which is a very impressive result.  Our sincere thanks to local volunteer Ann McMenamin for organising her wonderful volunteers and to everyone in Topsham on Saturday, August 21st who gave their support.

Posted on 25 Aug, 2010 - 10:13 AM

Wanted Socks

With the recent high numbers of clients (often up to 50 a day) using our centre, we are now very short of sleeping bags - if you have one or, even better, two that you could donate please can you either call 422396 to arrange collection or drop them in to us - they will be very much appreciated.

Posted on 26 Jul, 2010 - 08:30 AM

Newsletter

Our latest newsletter is now out and can be viewed on our Media Page.  In this quarter’s edition focusses on Harvest Festival, which may seem a long way off but we wanted to get our message to local community groups, churches and schools in plenty of time.  This year, we have put together a ‘most wanted list’ as we still have a good supply of pasta and tinned goods which is featured in the newsletter.

Posted on 26 Jul, 2010 - 08:23 AM

Dragon Boat Race

Our team, Petrock’s Pirates, managed to raise over £320 at the Dragon Boat Race on July 11th for the local Dream-a-way charity.  Thank you to everyone who supported us in making sure our team of clients/volunteers was able to take part - it was such an enjoyable day that we are committed to next year’s race and with some more practise sessions!

Posted on 26 Jul, 2010 - 08:19 AM

High Sheriff’s Garden Party

We are very grateful to Betty d’Erlanger, the High Sheriff of Devon, for supporting homelessness as her cause and St Petrock’s at both her Legal Service and Garden Party.  These events led to donations of over £1400 being received - so thank you again Betty.

Posted on 26 Jul, 2010 - 08:16 AM

Remedies Fundraiser

Our thanks to everyone who took part in Remedies’ beauty treatment offer in May, which raised £317.50!  Special thanks to Wendy Wills of Remedies for organising the event and Emma for providing the beauty treatments free of charge each Saturday in May for a donation to St Petrock’s.

Posted on 10 Jun, 2010 - 02:32 PM

Dragon Boat Race

We’d like your support to help our team participate in this year’s Dragon Boat Race, on July 11th at Exeter Quay, in aid of Dream-A-Way charity which provides holidays and days trips for people of all ages with physical and learning difficulties. Our team will be mainly made up of people who are currently rough sleeping or living in temporary accommodation who, in spite of their circumstances, want to help others enjoy a more fulfilled life.  If you’d like to make a donation please contact .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). - we don’t have long so please get in touch as soon as possible!

Posted on 03 Jun, 2010 - 09:28 AM

Wish List

Our Wish List for donated items is now up and running on the Get Involved page. We urgently require sleeping bags and men’s socks so if you can help please get in touch!

Posted on 27 May, 2010 - 08:49 AM

St Petrock’s Day

Join us in St Petrock’s church on Friday, June 4th to celebrate St Petrock’s Day and discover how the church has evolved over the centuries with local archaeologist, Richard Parker.  You will also be able to find out how ‘the other half’ is used as a resource centre for people who are homeless in the city from former clients of St Petrock’s charity and staff.  There will also be live music and refreshments. Doors will open at 10.30am to 2.30pm

Posted on 19 May, 2010 - 01:52 PM

Remedies Offer

Free beauty treatments are available every Saturday in May at Remedies of Topsham, for a small donation to St Petrock’s.  Call 01392 877221 to make your appointment with Emma.

Posted on 16 Apr, 2010 - 11:19 AM

Puertas Quartet success

The Puertas Quartet concert in Topsham raised a staggering £600!  Our grateful thanks to organiser Sheila Burgess and her helpers for such an enjoyable and successful event on April 6th and, of course, to the Puertas Quartet who played beautifully.

Posted on 16 Apr, 2010 - 11:09 AM

Devon Contract Waste

To help us with our running costs, Devon Contract Waste has offered to collect our waste and recycling free of charge which is a wonderful gesture and could help us save up to £1000 in waste disposal.  Simon Almond MD of Devon Contract Waste said, ” We wanted to help St Petrock’s in some way and congratulate them for all the great work they do so we decided to make this offer.”  Find out more about Devon Contract Waste. 

Posted on 31 Mar, 2010 - 12:41 PM

The Puertas Quartet

Residents of Topsham have the opportunity to enjoy works form Mozart, Hayden and Beethoven performed by the young and vibrant Puertas Quartet on Tuesday, April 6th at 7.30pm in St Margaret’s Church, Topsham with proceeds in aid of St Petrock’s.  Tickets are available from Joel Segal Books and Topsham Video Centre or on the door and cost £7 including a glass of wine/juice.

Posted on 17 Mar, 2010 - 11:10 AM

Exeter City FC Collection

With the wonderful efforts of our five-a-side football team, we collected £329.29 at the recent Exeter City vs. Oldham match on March 6th.  Our thanks to Andy Cole, Charity Collection Co-Ordinator for granting the collection at St James Park. Click here to see the magnificent St Petrock’s five-a-side team!

Posted on 17 Mar, 2010 - 11:01 AM

WAW

Each afternoon during the week of March 22nd - 26th, we will be putting on Wild Art Week which will provide a variety of types of art for people to sample.  Wild Art Week will be open to our clients as well as people on referral from other agencies in the city.  Art organisations such as Spacex, Exeter Phoenix, Double Elephant, RAMM and Exeter College are already signed up to take part and we hope that a second Wild Art Week will take place later in the year.

Please click here for the Wild Art Week Calendar.

Posted on 12 Feb, 2010 - 03:23 PM

Annual Report

Our Annual Report for ‘08/‘09 is out now and contains details of our work and achievements in the past year.  It is available on-line but if you would like to receive a copy by post then please click on ‘Contact Us’ at the top of the page. All of us, at St Petrock’s,  would like to thank Graeme Norways for the design and production of this year’s report which he took on at minimal cost.  We very much appreciate the time and effort which he put into the project and also to Ruaraidh Monies for his photography.
To download a copy, please click here…

Posted on 02 Feb, 2010 - 03:57 PM

Morrison Vouchers

We’d like to thank Janice Papworth and family for providing us with £1,000 worth of Morrison vouchers.  Janice told us she had often wondered how best to help people she saw sleeping on the streets and then she saw a competition on Absolute Radio’s website asking people to nominate a cause they felt would benefit from receiving such a prize.  Janice nominated St Petrock’s and won!  Linda, our kitchen manager, was delighted,” It was a wonderful surprise and they will be very useful in helping us provide clients with fresh vegetables, meat and fruit as and when we need them.”

Posted on 27 Jan, 2010 - 10:55 AM

Street Collection

Despite icy weather and the recession, Exeter’s shoppers generously gave £578.85 during our late night shopping street collection in the city on Dec 17th.  Not only were we fortunate to have the help of 12 collectors but we also had the support of the choir from St Thomas Methodist Church, led by volunteer Penny Briggs, who all sang beautifully in St Petrock’s church entrance and attracted a lot of interest. Thanks to all those involved as we managed to collect nearly £150 more than last year!

Posted on 23 Dec, 2009 - 01:33 PM

Christmas tree donation

On behalf of everyone at St Petrock’s, we’d like to thank all the staff and children of Bowhill Primary School for the donation of their Christmas tree at the end of term.  It was a great Christmas present and STP staff and clients really enjoyed decorating it! 

Posted on 23 Dec, 2009 - 01:19 PM

Congratulations to STP football team

Congratulations to the St Petrock’s Five-a-Side football team for their first match win of the Inter-agency Challenge Cup!  With four clients and one staff volunteer, the St Petrock’s side then went on to come second in the next match and in Devon FA’s Langdon Event held on November 3rd. 

Posted on 09 Dec, 2009 - 04:55 PM

Topsham Fundraiser

Volunteer Ann MacMenamin, with the help of Trustee David Woods and his wife Brenda, managed to raise £263.50 selling bric-a-brac at Topsham Hall on November 14th which was a great result given the terrible weather!

Posted on 27 Oct, 2009 - 03:29 PM

Christmas Tree Wanted!

If you have a decorated Christmas Tree in your office or school which you won’t need in the Christmas holidays perhaps you would let us know and we could use it to decorate our centre on Christmas and Boxing Day.  We will close on Friday Dec 23rd at 1pm (until Sun Dec 25th) so if you could call 422396 and speak to Gill, we will happily re-cycle your Christmas tree!

Posted on 27 Oct, 2009 - 03:25 PM

Christmas cards on sale

This year’s Christmas cards are on sale at St Martin’s shop in Cathedral Yard.  Packs of 10 cost £3.50. Two wonderful designs by our clients are still available - so make sure you pick up a pack or two!

Posted on 27 Oct, 2009 - 03:21 PM

Thank you for Harvest Festival

Thank you to everyone for your generous donations of Harvest Festival, we have almost filled the crypt this year!  Given the challenges we face in meeting our financial obligations this helps enourmously.  So thank you for your generousity!

Posted on 27 Oct, 2009 - 11:03 AM

St Stephen’s Fundraiser

St Stephen’s fundraiser on Saturday, August 29th was a great success with £503.44 being raised!  Many thanks to the volunteers, clients and friends who turned out on the day to help with the sale of bric-a-brac and homemade cakes.

Posted on 15 Sep, 2009 - 01:21 PM

Amazing donation of £45k

A local donor has made an amazing donation of £45k to St Petrocks.  “We have never before received such a large, private donation,” said Mel Hartley, Project Manager, “and we are extremely grateful to the donor for choosing St Petrock’s for such a generous philanthropic act.  This money will be used to provide on-going advice and referral services, basic survival services and family reconciliation for our clients.

“It could not have come at a better time as we were facing a very difficult year ahead however this award, spread over three years, will certainly help us meet our challenges.  The money was also gift-aided which has mean that we have been able to reclaim the tax and that has provided an additional £12,000.”  The donor has asked to remain anonymous.

Posted on 01 Sep, 2009 - 10:50 AM

Thanks to our supporters in Topsham

The Tophsam Street Collection on Saurday, August 22nd raised £627.05 - an amazing amount!  Many thanks to our volunteer Ann McMenamin, who organised the collection and her wonderful gang of collectors and to everyone in Topsham for showing such generous support.

Posted on 25 Aug, 2009 - 11:55 AM

Harvest Festival Wish List

If you’d like to donate at Harvest Festival this year please see our Wish List.  Please also note our “Donations Deliveries” advice.

Harvest Festival Wish List

* Coffee
* Tea
* White granulated sugar/ soft brown sugar
* Orange squash/fruit juices
* Cup-a-soups (esp. tomato)
* Tinned fruit
* Tinned meat/fish
* Tinned custard/puddings
* Dried pasta, pulses, beans
* Fresh fruit (windfalls cannot be accepted)
* Fresh vegetables
* Packaged breakfast cereals
* Pasta sauces/curry sauces
* Dried fruit, sultanas, raisins
* Jams, spreads, marmalade
* Biscuits
* Toiletries (toothbrushes, toothpaste, shampoo, shower gel, shaving foam, disposable razors, suntan lotion, etc…)

WE ALSO ARE IN GREAT NEED OF RUCKSACKS, WETWEATHER GEAR, SLEEPING BAGS, and MENS BOOTS.

Posted on 24 Jul, 2009 - 11:10 AM

£3,000 award from Abbey for ICT training

The Abbey Charitable Trust has awarded St Petrock’s with £3,000 to improve ICT training at the centre.  Basic Skills tutor at St Petrock’s, Keith Johnson said “We’re delighted that the Abbey Charitable Trust has made this award which will enable us to buy 6 new laptops.  We will now be able to offer not only ICT courses and qualifications to more of our clients but also use more ICT in our literacy and numeracy classes creating a more rounded learning experience for everyone.

“Our accredited courses have been popular with clients and, for many, passing one of these has been their first educational achievement.  As a Phase 3 Functional Skills pilot centre with the National Open College Network (NOCN), we expect around 40 clients to benefit each year from a range of IT courses we will now be able to offer.  We estimate the laptops have a life of at least 5 years, thereby, providing employability skills to some 200 disadvantaged people in the area.”

Anoushka Lander, CSR Communications Manager at Abbey, said ” We are always on the look out for good causes that need our help.  We are delighted to fund the new IT equipment for St Petrock’s and we hope that even more service users will benefit over the coming years.”

Posted on 23 Jul, 2009 - 09:23 AM

Celebration Day collection

Our awareness campaign during Celebration Day (June 27) on Cathedral Green raised an amazing £620! 

Posted on 03 Jul, 2009 - 10:46 AM

Client Artwork Exhibition

Don’t miss our first exhibition of Client Artwork at ExeterPhoenix from Wednesday, September 9th to Sunday, 4th October.

Posted on 30 Jun, 2009 - 12:55 PM

Provincial Donation

Thank you to Provincial Grand Lodge of Devonshire (WAKE Fund) for its donation of £1,000.

Posted on 30 Jun, 2009 - 12:53 PM