Charitable activities

Our relationship with the charity Barretstown is at the centre of our charitable and community activities. We get as much out of this partnership as they do.

Barretstown provides a programme of therapeutic recreation for children with cancer and other serious illnesses. Through their participation in Barretstown programmes, the children stop seeing themselves as ‘sick kids’ and begin to regain their own inner strength, confidence and self-esteem.

The Barretstown programme is backed by leading medical specialists as a valuable part in a child’s recovery from serious illness. The parents do not pay anything. Funding comes from individuals and from institutions. Although the programme is based at Barretstown castle in Ballymore Eustace, Ireland, Barretstown is very much an international charity and has served over 11,000 children from 22 European countries since it opened in 1994.

Our involvement with Barretstown is physical, almost visceral; that doesn't happen often with lawyers. We help them contact other countries, we advise them on property issues, and we arrange legal advice. We work as volunteers and we raise funds for them.
This is not a one-off annual fund-raising activity. It’s not a relationship conducted at a distance. We are in it for the long term.

The opportunities for involvement are tremendous. Our finance and human resources departments have enjoyed weekend team building visits in the past year, with others keen to be involved.

Barretstown is about “serious fun”. It’s not quantifiable, but we think that our contact with them will, over time, help our people to think more creatively.

Fresh perspectives tend to produce fresh thinking.

http://www.barretstown.org