The Turas Nua team in Kerry recently ‘gave back’ to their local community by spending a day volunteering their time with BUMBLEance, the Children’s Ambulance Service in Killarney.

Turas Nua team members from Killarney, Tralee, Listowel, Dingle and Caherciveen braved the wet conditions and spent the afternoon running a street bucket collection to raise funds for this vital service.

BUMBLEance is the first service of its kind in the world and operates nearly 2,000 trips per year. They provide safe and comfortable transportation for Ireland’s youngest patients as they travel between their homes and hospitals, hospices, treatment centres and respite centres. Their aim is to distract, comfort and entertain these young patients on their health related trips.

Turas Nua aims to empower jobseekers, providing them with training and assistance so that they can work towards securing and sustaining full time employment or to explore self-employment. They provide this service in Kerry and across 12 other counties in the south of Ireland.

Being a central part of the community is a core principle behind the work of Turas Nua. That is why Turas Nua developed their ‘Give Back Day’, an annual programme whereby the various offices of Turas Nua operating around the country give a day’s worth of activity to help local community groups, nonprofit organisations and charities in areas that require support.

“As part of our normal working process, each day we put a focus on improving the communities we work in. Normally that is through our work supporting individuals seeking employment or training, as well as by assisting the thousands of employers we work with around the country,” said JulieAnn McCann, General Manager of Turas Nua.

“The work done by our team of volunteers in Kerry with BUMBLEance is a prime example of this. Here we were able to help this brilliant child focused health service to raise funds, sparing their personnel time and effort. At the end of the day, organisations like ours and other businesses are all products of the communities in which they are based. We strongly believe it is important that community link is recognised and we hope to be able to make even more tangible and positive contributions locally in the future.”