On Tuesday 11 February, CSAN hosted an event in the Houses of Parliament for our members. This was entitled, ‘Celebration of Catholic Social Action Network in England & Wales’. We were joined by 27 members and around 10 MPs.
We were joined by:
- Ian Byrne MP
- Archbishop Malcolm McMahon – Archbishop of Liverpool and Chair of CSAN
- Raymond Friel – CSAN
- Kate Nightingale – St Vincent de Paul Society
- Anita Motha – Million Minutes
Whilst our original host, Mike Kane MP (Wythenshawe and Sale East), wasn’t able to be us, we were welcomed by Ian Byrne MP (Liverpool West Derby). He commented on how impressed he was the scale and depth of the Caritas network here in England and Wales.
Archbishop Malcolm spoke about the scope of the Network and highlighted the work of the Caritas Academy to contributing to the formation of tomorrow’s leaders.
Raymond used this opportunity to invite the Government and all MPs to work with us on long term solutions to poverty, isolation, and exploitation. He asked for MPs and the Lord’s help to remove some of the barriers CSAN members face in doing their work, including the recent increase in National Insurance contributions. Because of this, he also stressed the reality that many charities within the private sector are struggling to bear the severe burden of maintaining and delivering current levels of operations for the most vulnerable in society.
Kate mentioned the ubiquity of the SVP and because of this, there was more that they did do than didn’t. The SVP has the biggest volunteering structure within CSAN, with 9500 people offering their time and capacity in some form or another.
Finally, Anita spoke about the scandal of poverty within our homes, especially in relation to how it affects young people. This issue is close to the mission of Million Minutes who work alongside young people to empower them to take transformative social action.
We estimated that there was little less than 100 people in the room throughout the evening. We are grateful for all of those able to make it.
We are grateful to Marcin Mazur for the pictures.
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