2007 Guide Charity Donations

[Doris]

Right then!

As part of my role as Head of Charity I need to find out what you lot think...

We are planning on introducing the option of making a donation to charity for downloading next year's CA Guide to LM.  Initially I need to know if members would rather split these funds between a few nominated charities or champion one charity for the year.

Answers on a postcard please

Dx

[smokie]

I'd nominate any of the Air Ambulances - certainly a few years back they had no central govt or NHS funding.

[rcutler]

Good Idea,

Maybe would could split is between the Air Ambulances and the Coastguard.

We hope never to have to use them on our way to LM but they are voluntary also.

[Paddy_NL]

Maybe stick with the same horrible disease but then for children? Then again, smokie's charity makes more sense as for support and attention.

I think it's better to stick to only one charity though, might keep it all more clear.

[Steve Pyro]

Good Idea,

Maybe would could split is between the Air Ambulances and the Coastguard.

We hope never to have to use them on our way to LM but they are voluntary also.

Rick, the Coastguard is not voluntary - it is a government body.
However, the RNLI IS a voluntarily manned charity organisation.


I think a split donation is a sensible option.
I suggest, as the big name charities always seem to attract the most publicity, and, hence, the most public donations, we consider some of the smaller (but equally as worthy) charities.
As we are a motor sport oriented forum, how about the Motor Sport Safety Fund http://www.motorsportsafetyfund.com/

The Motorsport Safety Fund is a registered charity formed in 1974 to help improve safety in the sport. It does this mainly by communication through the Watkins Lecture and the publications, DVDs and videos described on this site.

After the death of Roger Williamson at Zaandvoort in 1974, a fund was set up in his name with the primary aim of educating marshals on fire fighting and rescue techniques.

In 1987, it was reconstituted as the Motor Racing Safety Fund and became a registered UK charity (number 296802) with the wider scope to generally aid improvements in safety standards at motorsport events. In 1999, the name was simplified to the Motorsport Safety Fund to reflect the fact that it tries to help all branches of the sport.

The Fund has no formal link with the Royal Automobile Club’s Motor Sports Association - the governing body for the sport in the UK - although it does work very closely with the Association.

Motorsport Safety Fund
PO Box 200, Sevenoaks TN15 8WZ, UK
 

[hgb]

I second all above ideas and throw in a donation to Radio LeMans.

[Lorry]

Difficult one.  And there is a third option - to change it every year.  I think we ought to be democratic about it.  Use this topic to produce a shortlist and then vote on it.

I'd go with Cancer Research, or perhaps something like the Richard Burns Foundation.

Whoops, should have hit "post" 2 hours ago

[DelBoy]

Very difficult.  Most charities are more than worthy of our support, but we can't support them all.

After much thought, I would go with one charity, and to stay with the Cancer theme, and would suggest CLIC (Cancer and Leukemia in Children). 

After everyone who wants to has had their say, I would be happy for our good lady 'Head of Charity' to make the decision - she chose a good one before.

Del

[fagey]

i go for cancer research also

[Andy Zarse]

Some good points above. I reclon if we can raise enough we could split it between three or four charities. But it has to be enough to make a difference. Anyway, we could have a thread where we can all nominate our favoured charity and offer a brief word why we think it should be on the "panel". Then we have a poll. Top three or four win. Once the charity has been on the panel they should be excluded the following year.

Here's a rhetorical question - we are a motorsport based forum, so would those people downloading the LM Guide be more inclined to give if it were to charities they were vaguely interested in i.e. motoring and/or sports charities?

My own nomination would be for Sport Relief, mainly cos I met the celebrity cricket team when I was in India and  I was interested to hear what they had to say over a few beers after the match against the Bollywood XI in Bombay. I subsequently saw those poor little kids working in the beating sun on that massive sh-it tip. Words cannot describe that stench and filth in which they lived, and really I was very moved by the experience. Indeed I've plans afoot to try and do something on a personal level for Sport Relief later in the year. Watch this space!

[Ferrari Spider]

just as a pointer, couple of big IFs here.  there have been about 3000 downloads for the 2006 guide, we will ask for each download the equivalent of the autosport LM guide which is about 3-4 GBP's, so potentially there could be 9-12K GBP's in the kitty.

The main part of the guide will be available earlier than this year, which could mean more demand?  So the above is achievable.

my vote is definitely to split the fund across a number of charities.  Hope this helps put it into a little more perspective.  FS

[smokie]

just as a pointer, couple of big IFs here.  there have been about 3000 downloads for the 2006 guide, we will ask for each download the equivalent of the autosport LM guide which is about 3-4 GBP's, so potentially there could be 9-12K GBP's in the kitty.

It's a HUGE If.

I know if I found something like this which you had to pay for there is a good chance that a mate and I would go halves, one of us would d/l it then copy it for the other.  Already done it on the TomTom European speed camera overlays.

It would only take one person from another well attended forum to pay for the download, then host it himself as a free d/l, linked to from a forum, for our projections to be totally blown away. OK we could make it copyright but in reality how would that help?

Maybe people would take a different view if the money was going to charity but I don't think the (awesome) number of downloads this year can safely be used as a measure of possibilities for next year.

I'd love to be proved wrong. 

[Steve Pyro]

just as a pointer, couple of big IFs here.  there have been about 3000 downloads for the 2006 guide, we will ask for each download the equivalent of the autosport LM guide which is about 3-4 GBP's, so potentially there could be 9-12K GBP's in the kitty.

..... and a big assumption that 3000 people make a charitable donation.

[Steve Pyro]

Further to Smokie's post, I know for a fact that the 2006 downloadable PDF was copied and hosted on the UK Cobra Replica Club site.

http://www.cobraclub.com/forum/showpost.php?p=147442&postcount=3

http://www.cobraclub.com/caguide2006-full.pdf

It's still there!  Who knows how many times it was downloaded from there?

[Ferrari Spider]

so what is it you are trying to say then Steve?