Posts Tagged ‘hag’

Last Wednesday, I was out with the Humanist Action Group doing our usual feed the homeless bit, when we found a man who looked rather ill.

When we spoke to him, he said he was suffering from septicemia. He was clearly in a bad way, one foot was swollen so much you could see how much bigger it was than the other and he had some nasty holes in his legs which were slowly oozing puss. It really wasn’t something I enjoyed looking at.

When we asked him whether he had been to the hospital, he said yes and they had given him some antibiotics. However, they were about to run out and now he couldn’t afford any more.

Now, you would assume that a) he is clearly in need of medical treatment and b) he doesn’t have a job so doesn’t really have any means to pay for prescriptions, you would think that the supposed free healthcare system we operate in the UK, would provide.

But it doesn’t.

If you take a look at the NHS website, it explains that there are only a handful of exemptions to prescription charges and unless you’re on income support or income related job seekers allowance, you still have to pay. Of course, homeless people rarely are on these schemes, leaving them very little access to medical treatment.

I think my tax bill is very high. But, every month when I took at my payslip and see how much has been taken off by the government before I even get to see it, I take some comfort in the fact that it is going to help those less fortunate than me, I mean that’s the point of having a social welfare state right? But incidents like this make you question, how many people are slipping through the gaps?

We’re pleased to announce that today we are launching the first in what will be a series of guides by the Humanist Action Group. HAG does great work in Leeds and if you have ever thought about running such a group in your local community, these guides are for you.

The guides have been under development for a while and we would like to say a big thank you to everyone who has contributed to them.

The first guide we are making available is the organiser’s guide which explains the basics of organising a group, finding and recruiting volunteers, staying on top of everything and making sure you have the correct paperwork in place.

The second guide we are launching today is the homeless guide which explains how to run a simple feed the homeless programme. If you would like to get a copy of these, just get in touch!

We have further guides under development also, to keep an eye out for those.

On Monday, the Humanist Action Group of Leeds completed it’s holiday food drive. Having spent the previous two weeks collecting food and donations to put together food parcels for local homeless shelters, the group spend the night bringing together all the food and packaging it up.

In total the group managed 24 boxes, most of which had to be duct taped shut due to them overflowing. The lesson for next time – we need bigger boxes!

The new Humanist Action Group website is now live!

HAG was founded in 2009 with the idea that we should stop talking about how Humanism is about living a good and ethical life which makes the most of it for ourselves and those around us and get out there and start making a difference – not because scripture told us we should but because it is the right thing to do.

The new website makes it easier for people to get involved in volunteering – simply fill in your details and enter your nearest town or city. We will then match your details to local volunteering opportunities that HAG is coordinating and let you know when they are available.

Yesterday’s homeless action saw the best attendance for a Humanist Action Group of Leeds event in the history of the group.

As you’ll probably be aware the weather in the UK has been rather cold over the past month with several heavy snowfalls and as a result the group has made a special effort to make sure volunteers were on hand when needed.

Luckily everyone living on the city centre’s streets managed to make it into a shelter during the snowfall – it’s actually a really good feeling when you go out in the snow and find nobody because it means chances are they are somewhere warmer. Now people are back on the streets however we really need people to continue to sign up and volunteer their time.

If you are interested in volunteering you can register your details on the website or find out more about the group on their Facebook page.

Thursday saw Moz and Sarann come on their first HAG outing. While it wasn’t the best of nights with it having poured down a few hours before there were at least some people out and about so it wasn’t a wasted night. Better than Sophie & Jon’s first time!

Today saw HAG expand in a new direction as we headed out to remove some of the graffiti in Hyde Park. It turned out to be really succesful, snowballing when a bunch of random kids from the block turned up and decided to help out – crazy times!

Thursday was an evening of problems. Having left work at a reasonable time to run home and get a shower I phoned Nicola to sort out times for the evening. Which didn’t work because her phone is broken. And her backup phone is lost. That is like a double RAID array failure. I did say that girl was trouble.

Anyway I Facebooked her all the details but she didn’t reply. Running late I decided to run by Parkinson building anyway just to see if she had got the message and turned up but she hadn’t. So I headed off towards Rich’s when I got a phone call from her asking where I was as she was about to get to Parkinson 😀 .

Minor problems compared to when we got down to Rich’s and realised that we didn’t actually have a flask for the coffee lol. Rich had left his at Rationalist Week and mine was packed away somewhere but apparently not in my HAG bag so we ended up having to make a short trip to Tesco for some cold drink alternatives as well as some food.

In the end it all worked out rather nicely though as we made it back just in time for Question Time.

Having left work at about 6 last night I headed off to meet Nicola for the usual Thursday night HAG activities. It was a mildly successful night, there were a few people out so a bit better (or perhaps worse) than last week.

Finally pulled up outside my house at about 9pm when I got a text from Zoe inviting me down to the pub. Of course this left me with no option but to head out again (after all I hadn’t been to the pub since Tuesday at this point!)

It’s tough getting through these long nights but somehow I manage it 😀 .

Thursday saw HAG head out with some new volunteers in the form of Sophie and Jon. Turns out, we’ve solved the problem again though.

What we need to work on now is exporting HAG to various other cities around the UK, after all as it stands we have a higher success rate than Narconon ;).