Since our business was founded in 2006, ARAG has supported many charities and community organisations, and encouraged staff to provide practical help wherever we can. In June, for example, members of the ATE team climbed Yr Wyddfa in North Wales, otherwise known as Mount Snowdon, to raise money for the charity AvMA (Action against Medical Accidents).
This year, however, we’re especially focussed on a new community effort, following the launch of a global initiative, ARAG DAY.
Part of the international ARAG Group’s 5->30 programme, which defines 5 key objectives that we aim to achieve by 2030, ARAG DAY falls under ARAG’s driving purpose of extending access to justice as widely as possible.
Here in the UK, we’ve partnered with the Bristol Law Centre to support the invaluable work that it does, providing legal advice and assistance to people, many of whom are unlikely to have the benefit of a legal protection policy.
Of course, ARAG DAY is about much more than the single day at the end of September when ARAG shone a light on the many causes, around the world that ARAG companies are assisting.
Throughout the year, Bristol Law Centre staff have joined our own teams in fundraising events, like the Dragon Boat Racing festival in Bristol Harbour, but we’re also providing practical help wherever we can, while trying to raise the profile of the law centre too.
In the week leading up to ARAG DAY, we worked with Ashfords LLP – one of ARAG’s partner law firms which has offices very close to the Bristol Law Centre – to provide face-to-face advice clinics in family and employment law, extending the centre’s capacity to help people in the local community.
We’re also working longer-term with Ashfords on a number of other employment cases that the law centre is unable to support.
Perhaps the highlight of ARAG DAY for our staff was crossing the (virtual) finish line, after taking turns on static bikes to ride over a thousand miles. While most of the ground was covered without leaving the lawn in front of 7-9 Whiteladies Road, the distance is equivalent to riding from our Bristol HQ to ARAG Tower in Düsseldorf, and back again.
While the sun may have set on the first, official ARAG DAY, we’re still working with Bristol Law Centre and you can still sponsor the team for their monumental efforts here.
