Voluntary Action South West Surrey

Zero Carbon Guildford is a charity set up to enable local community action to tackle the climate and ecological crisis and associated social issues.

Zero Carbon Guildford operates a Community Hub, in the centre of Guildford, to enable the community to come together to tackle these issues.  

The Hub includes a café, houses our many projects  and showcases ways local people can make changes to help Guildford's journey towards a zero-carbon future. 

Located in the heart of the village of Pirbright, Cunningham House offers a home to nine older independent individuals. 

Part of the Abbeyfield Society, we exist to help those who have come to the stage in their lives when living alone becomes a daunting and isolating experience. 

Cunningham House enables residents to maintain their independence in the comfort and privacy of their own ensuite room, with the opportunity to enjoy the company of others over delicious home cooked meals and social activities. 

We have three paid members of staff, and a friendly and involved volunteers serving as committee members, gardeners and visitors. 

We are one Parish with welcoming and inclusive Churches.
Our vision is for the growth of God's Kingdom so we aim to:

  Grow in Spiritual Maturity
  Grow in Numbers
  Grow Younger
  Grow in Community Engagement 

The Brigitte Trust is a Queen's Award registered charity offering a free service of emotional support and practical help.  The service is offered face-to-face in the home supporting people and their carers when a life-threatening illness such as Cancer or Motor Neurone Disease has been diagnosed.The Brigitte Trust is a trusted partner of Surrey County Council and over 400 referrals are received every year throughout Surrey.  More volunteers are needed now to support people who have received a life-limiting diagnosis.

The British Regional Transport Association (BRTA) is a voluntary membership-based, pro-public transport improvement association with several of its projects having a nationwide positive benefit and impact. Membership is open to all.

The detection work of Cancer Testing South is driven by a passion to find early indications of prostate cancer and also lead to the uncovering of other frequently overlooked cancer through both testing with a simple blood test and by promoting awareness. We aim to learn educate and use knowledge, to reduce death from prostate and other cancers that regularly respond to early intervention.

We will change the lives of disabled people using expertly trained dogs to improve physical, emotional and social wellbeing. 

The Green Hub Project for Teens is a local community project serving Surrey & Hampshire and surrounding areas. It supports young people (11-18) facing social, emotional and mental health challenges, along with their families and carers. In addition, Green Hub works to promote awareness and understanding of mental health and emotional wellbeing for young people in the broader community.

Green Hub’s purpose is to achieve positive, measurable outcomes for teen mental health, including self-love, active lifestyles, social interaction and inclusion, as well as the development and application of a range of learned skills. Green Hub achieves this through its Teen Garden  social prescribing programme, talks and support groups within the local community, along with sharing useful information via the website.

Guildford Environment Forum are a Surrey based charity with a 25 year long history. We work to make Guildford (and the world beyond) a more sustainable place by educating, informing, cutting energy use, reducing ecological footprints, helping wildlife and tackling climate change. We work on local government climate Change committees, and run various hands-on projects that generate action on the environment within our local community. 

Guildford Twinning Association is a voluntary group which supports the town twinning of Guildford with the beautiful city of Freiburg in Southwest Germany. We promote international friendship, understanding and co-operation. We do this by:

• helping people in both towns to learn about each other and make friends
• supporting/managing exchanges: schools, sport, arts, music, social
• helping people in both towns to work together
• running events: social, arts, educational, fund-raising

See our website at guildfordtwinning.uk

Our aim is to promote the development of young people in achieving their full physical, intellectual, social and spiritual potentials, as individuals, as responsible citizens and as members of their local, national and international communities.

The method of achieving the aim of the association is by providing an enjoyable and attractive scheme of progressive training, based on the scout promise and law and guided by adult leadership and to have loads of FUN doing it!

At this very early stage of the project Homes for Farnham consists of a small group of people, who care about Farnham, the future of the town and the people in it. As individuals we are rooted in the Farnham community and have set up Homes for Farnham as a not-for-profit voluntary organisation for local people to learn about Community-Led Housing and how this new approach is able to build affordable homes. We’ve been inspired by other community housing groups elsewhere who have successfully completed projects providing affordable homes fully accountable to local communities. We are developing Homes for Farnham as a local housing hub to which anyone living or working in the Farnham district who faces housing issues is invited to join and share their experience

Parents Supporting Other Parents - a simple idea that really works!

Home-Start Guildford has been supporting local families across the Guildford Borough for over 25 years. 

We're a non-judgemental organisations that helps any parent who is struggling, for any reason. Some of those reasons may include; multiple births, mental health, an abusive partner, isolation, mental or physical handicap, or the pressure that loss of employment brings to a family.

What we do

Our charity provides a preventative service that aims to support families who are struggling by offering regular volunteer support to parents with at least one child under the age of 5, usually referred to us by Health Visitors.

We provide one-to-one support for parents:
Our volunteers visit the family’s home for a couple of hours every week.  They tailor-make their support to the needs of the parents and children. Volunteers are very committed and will keep visiting until the youngest child turns five or starts school, or until the parents feel they can stand on their own two feet.  Parents and volunteers often develop a deeply trusting relationship which can lead to powerful change within the family.

We also run two family groups for referred families, one in the Pirbright Community Centre and the other in the Guildford Family Group, Hazel Avenue.

Our values

• We offer families choice
• We work in partnership - with each other, with families and with other agencies,
• We work in a spirit of openness, encouragement and enjoyment
• We are flexible and responsive to the needs of families.

Volunteering Opportunities 

There are several ways that you can help in a voluntary capacity:

• by supporting a family as a home-visiting volunteer
• by helping at one of our Family Groups
• by joining the Trustee Board
• by becoming a Friend of Home-Start Guildford

Please see the volunteer roles listed for more detail.

Horsley, Bookham & Leatherhead Riding for the Disabled Association is a registered charity which provides facilities to benefit disabled children and young adults by having regular contact with horses.

​

We have been operating for over 30 years giving rides to children and young adults with physical and learning disabilities in Surrey. Our riders include those with autism, Down's Syndrome, spina bifida and dyspraxia.

​

Each week, with the assistance of our coaches and volunteers, our riders can enjoy the horse riding experience. This provides them with the chance to be independent, to feel a sense of achievement and it puts smiles on their faces!  If proof is needed of the therapeutic effect of riding, we had one little boy who had never spoken before and whose first word was the name of his pony.

​

Our dedicated team of volunteer coaches, group leaders and helpers is paramount to our continued success, without whom we could not operate. 

​

We are always looking for volunteers and sponsors, and welcome any contribution which will help keep this wonderful community effort going.

Helping families of seriously ill children to keep moving forward

From hospital to home and beyond, we’ll be with you and your family every step of the way.

Our vision
A world free from the effects of MS.
Our mission
To enable everyone affected by MS to
live life to their full potential and secure the
care and support they need, until we
ultimately find a cure.

Our core values show the way we all work together to bring forward the day when no one fears Parkinson's.

• People-first

We're a strong movement for change, informed, shaped and powered by people affected by Parkinson's. We value and support each other. 

• Uniting

We're people with Parkinson's, scientists and supporters, fundraisers and families, carers and clinicians. We're working, side by side, to improve the lives of everyone affected by Parkinson's.

• Pioneering

We innovate across everything we do. Creative, courageous and with pioneering spirit, we strive to continually improve. 

• Driven

We live and breathe our purpose. We set clear goals and strive to deliver the greatest impact for everyone affected by Parkinson's.

Puttenham Barn is run by a small environmental charity called Project Oasis North Downs (POND).

Its mission is to provide simple inexpensive overnight accommodation in a 250 year old barn, in an environmentally responsible way.

It is aimed at walkers, cyclists & people enjoying the surrounding beautiful countryside.

The Barn has many environmental features including solar panels (on its bike shed!), rainwater harvesting & local varieties of apple trees in the garden.

We aim to open at weekends, during school holidays and on as many other nights as we can between Easter & October.

We are working to deliver exceptional care in a welcoming and safe environment for patients at Royal Surrey Hospital.

From providing state of the art equipment and redeveloping wards, to investing in staff development and funding innovative research, our patients are at the heart of everything we do.

Working collaboratively with medical and support staff, we fund projects that make the biggest impact on the 260,000 people we treat each year – from babies, to children and young adults, to older people.

The charitable objectives of the RSPCA are to promote kindness and prevent or suppress cruelty to animals by all lawful means.

The branch promotes animal welfare in the local area primarily through veterinary assistance, neutering and re-homing. We run a voucher scheme which assists local people with veterinary bills for treatment and neutering. It also helps to control dog and cat populations, thereby promoting responsible pet ownership.

The branch assists the RSPCA animal centres, mainly Millbrook and South Godstone, with re-homing unwanted and abused animals by home-visiting.  We also pay for veterinary treatment of stray animals and wildlife attended to by the Inspectorate in our branch area.

The RSPCA provides advice for owners on animal care. It also helps animals brought to us for rehoming because their owners are unable or unwilling to keep them. Ill treated or injured animals are cared for by the Society. The public benefits from knowing that we can intervene to assist animals in need.

We have a website to raise awareness of the activities of the branch and to help members get more involved. We provide volunteering opportunities for those who wish to support our work, including trusteeship, fundraising and home visiting. This benefits local people and companies by providing the possibility of doing work which is compassionate and rewarding.

We also have to fundraise to enable us to continue with our charitable work. The RSPCA receives no government or lottery funding.

SMART Cranleigh is a village initiative focused on promoting good quality of life for local people by enabling local organisations to work together more effectively. We aim to support community led projects that make a positive difference to the lives of local people. Our vision is to help local people connect with their community and empower them to find the local support they want. We are non-political, non-denominational and non-governmental.

The Surrey Hills Society is an independent charity formed 15 years ago.  It promotes the positive enjoyment and care of the Surrey Hills Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, which is in the course of being rebranded as one of the UK’s National Landscapes. We encourage those who live, work in, or visit the area to explore and learn about the special qualities and distinctiveness of the area.  The Society also uses its extensive network to actively promote the conservation and enjoyment of the Surrey Hills.

In June 2019 the Society was presented with the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service which is the highest award for volunteer groups to recognise outstanding work done in their communities and is the equivalent of an MBE for voluntary organisations.

Our mission is summarised by four words: Conserve, Inspire, Educate and Enjoy.

For further information visit our website.

CKT believes no young person should be precluded from taking music lessons because either their parents cannot afford them or they are not inspired to take up lessons.  

We help fund music lessons for financially disadvantaged children and young people in Surrey whatever their level of musical development and tries to level the music playing field by funding inspirational performances to encourage children to take up instruments in schools where historically take up has been low.