“How to” spend more time as a family

Families around the nation are being encouraged to volunteer together to benefit the local community for part of CSV Make a Difference Day, the UK’s biggest single day of volunteering on Saturday 30 October.

New independent research commissioned by the CSV Make a Difference campaign reveals that up to half of British people want to spend more time with their family. The research shows we are a nation prevented from spending as much time with our families as we’d like. 41% of people aged 11 years plus feel they don’t spend enough time with their nearest and dearest, rising to 48% amongst 25-34 year olds. This year’s campaign is helping to bring people together by encouraging people to give time.

The UK’s volunteering charity, CSV has a host of free “How to” guides to inspire families and others to take part in Make a Difference Day:

•    Want to create a legacy that could last over 100 years? Get together with your loved ones and plant a family tree in your local community. The benefits are enormous! Did you know that in just one year an average tree can remove one tonne of carbon dioxide from the air and can provide enough oxygen for a family of four?

•    Spend time in the kitchen with the children baking a “celebrity” pumpkin pie by TV Chef Rachel Allen. Donate your delicious pie to an isolated neighbour, a nursing home or your local homeless shelter.

•    Why not spend an afternoon with the grandkids getting your hands dirty to help others? Make a mosaic door number designed by interior designer and TV presenter, Andrea Maflin. You can even print your own personalised t shirts, and Hemingway Design (as in Wayne Hemingway) have donated two fantastic sample images that you can use. Or get creative and design a t shirt for your local community sports or youth team or even your local homeless centre.

Last year over 67,000 volunteers took part by visiting isolated neighbours, cooking cakes for elderly residents, joining community sport events, holding jumble sales, clearing waterways, saving hedgehogs, holding intergenerational tea parties and helping children to read.  

This year's CSV Make a Difference Day, the UK's biggest single day of volunteering, is on Saturday 30th October with events taking place from 23rd October to 7th November.  Each year tens of thousands of people do 'good stuff' in the community; they bake cakes for nursing homes, create allotments in schools, tidy isolated neighbours' gardens, put on theatrical performances and visit patients in hospitals – to give a few examples.
 

To find out more about volunteering on CSV Make a Difference Day, call us on FREEPHONE 0800 284 533 or email difference@csv.org.uk

More information about the day can be found on our website www.csv.org.uk/difference

Notes for editors

For further press information call: Francesca Toma on 020 7812 0037/ 07966 168686 or Jason Tanner on 020 7812 0038 / 07941 433598
 

CSV Make a Difference Day takes place on Saturday 30 October 2010 and activities take part a week either side. Nearly three quarters of a million people have taken part since the launch of CSV Make a Difference Day in 1996, and thousands more are expected to give time rather than money to improve their local community this year. The campaign is organised by CSV (Community Service Volunteers).

CSV creates opportunities for people to take an active part in the life of their communities through volunteering, training and community action.

The Family Time Survey was commissioned by CSV Make a Difference Day and conducted by ICM. ICM interviewed a nationally representative sample of 2000 adults aged 18+ in GB via online between 9th and 14th July 2010. Surveys were conducted across the country and the results have been weighted to the profile of all adults.  100 children aged 11-17 were polled randomly across GB, fifty aged 11-14 and fifty aged 15-17. ICM is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules.  Further information at www.icmresearch.co.uk