2021 Highlights

Despite the impact of the pandemic still reverberating, there has been much to highlight and celebrate this year including:

The year started with a brilliant boost as the total fundraised from the Cook-Along exceeded £200K and as Spring sprung, we welcomed a new addition to Team IYF - you can meet all of the team here.

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Summer saw the launch of our new look website (we hope you like it!) and our fab four runners taking on the Vitality Big Half. A huge thanks to Peter Keenan-Gavaghan, our Treasurer; Maurice Malone the CEO of the Birmingham Irish Association; Triona Dowd, Chair of CAILS and CAILS council member Brian Keane who raised £10,000.

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Passing on the baton this Autumn through to our London Marathon runners who took on the famous London run or a 26.2-mile course of their choosing.

Well done and thank you to Heather Farrell, Kelly Lawlor, Frankie & Nikki Smyth for raising £5,000 and completing what was the 40th London Marathon!

Followed by a change of pace with the historic 100 kilometres of the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage, we are very grateful to Nancy and Triona Hickey for raising £7,000 for us.

We were thrilled to have been selected as a finalist in the social impact category at the 2021 Causeway Business Exchange Awards which took place in Edinburgh.

Our trustee Mark Gough spoke at the inaugural Business Post LIVE & iQuest’s UK & Ireland Business Lunch in October, where we were honoured to have been selected as the chosen charity.

Thanks to all the attendees, Business Post publisher Enda O'Coineen and the Business Post Group for raising over £13,000 at the event.

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This winter we had great fun attending the West London Irish Society dinner, which raised £7000 - thank you to Claire and Michael McCormick for organising such a great event.

Celebrations all round as our former IYF (UK) Chair & Trustee, Jim O'Hara, received a Presidential Distinguished Service Award for the Irish Abroad from President Higgins.

Last but of course by no means least, we were delighted to announce that Adrian Dunbar had helped us to launch our Winter Appeal’s ‘Do Well by Giving Back’ Campaign.

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Thank you to everyone for your collective support and we are proud of the resilience shown by the causes we work with who have continued to make it possible for young disadvantaged Irish people to access the integral services and information they need.