Partner Story - Actons Solicitors

Our working relationship with Reach is very much about mutual respect and exchange of skills. The Reach team works hard to understand our CSR objectives and responds creatively. For our part, working with Reach has enabled our people to gain insight into the needs and concerns of people with learning disabilities and their families.

We first became aware of Reach when director Nicky Calthrop-Owen shared the news of her volunteering experiences at Flower Pod and Reach Newark. Inspired by Nicky’s energy and enthusiasm, we planned a corporate volunteering day in October 2018, helping out at Flower Pod. It was a real success and our team returned to the office feeling like they had really given something back to the local community, and learnt some new skills! We enjoyed it so much that we are hoping to organise another for later this year. We’re also looking forward to Christmas wreath workshops in December.

At Actons, we work closely with several local charities, providing advice to their clients and service users on a range of personal legal issues,
including wills, trusts and estate planning. We know that fears about future finances are a big concern for families, so it seemed a good fit
for us to get involved in helping Reach shape their gift and legacy programme. As part of that project, our Wills, Trusts and Probate
team run free workshops for family carers at Reach Southwell, raising awareness of making Wills, Lasting Powers of Attorney and Trusts.
In the spirit of reciprocity, some of our team recently attended one of Reach’s excellent autism awareness training days. This training,
and our volunteering, has helped us to think as a team and individuals about how to make our communications and environment more
accessible.

We’re looking forward to a long, productive relationship with Reach. There’s lots coming up including a sponsored walk, more volunteering,
new workshops for family carers, a legacy workshop for the public and more training for our staff.

We’re absolutely delighted to be working with the team at Reach on so many exciting and very worthwhile projects. Once we’d all heard
from Nicky about the amazing work they do, we were really keen to see it first-hand and help them do even more.

Working alongside the team at Reach is great- they have a real energy and enjoyment for what they do in improving the lives of people with learning disabilities and their families, and I look forward to helping our relationship go from strength to strength.

Matt Coleman, Marketing & Business Development Manager at Actons, and a member of their CSR committee.