Quarter Of Britons Feel More Connected To Community Than Country, Woolf Institute Finds

[Guest]

Local activists, volunteers and community workers have a crucial role in supporting people in times of crisis, a new report into trust and faith has found, echoing the response to the Grenfell Tower fire disaster. Government at all levels currently fails to realise the full potential communities themselves can hold in responding to a crisis, the report by the Woolf Institute said. It found a quarter of Britons feel greater connection and hold more shared values with their local communities than with the country as a whole.

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/trust-in-crisis-woolf-institute-report_uk_595e5b3ce4b0d5b458e8c620?utm_hp_ref=uk

[Original Quill]

Perhaps we need smaller nation-states. I've been advocating this here in the US. California and a few neighbors form the Pacific States of America.

Beautiful.

[Syl]

Maybe recent governments have a lot to do with people not feeling a greater affinity to the country.
Many communities are close....the proof is the way ordinary people who live in the neighbourhood have rallied round when disasters happen.
We have seen that in Manchester....and it's been proven in London also. I'm sure it's even more prevalent in smaller communities.

['Wolfie]

In relatively small countries (population wise..) like Australia and New Zealand, (and Canada ?), community and volunteer groups are at the centre of disaster relief and emergency care efforts...

For example, here in Oz, the following are mainly staffed with unpaid volunteers, providing $$hundreds of millions$$ in volunteer labour each year :

State Emergency Service, Rural Fire Service, Volunteer Coast Guard, Surf Lifesaving Assoc., Volunteer Rescue Assoc, Ski patrols, Bushwalking Search and Rescue;

Lions, Rotary, Apex, Probus, Jaycees;  Men's Sheds;  Country Women's Association;

Smith Family, Samaritans, Centrecare, Salvation Army..

If it wasn't for countless hours from the volunteer groups in Oz and NZ, the authorities and regular emergency services simply couldn't cope during intense and large scale disasters, nor when considering the remoteness and out-of-hours nature of so many emergencies. Not to mention all of the small everyday messes and problems covered by many local community groups (e.g. Lions, Rotary, Landcare, St Vincent de Paul, the SDA's community arm, Migrant Resource Centres, the CWA and Men's Sheds in certain areas,  etc..).        

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