Community & Social Responsibility

Our goal is to maintain a continuing commitment to behave ethically and to contribute to the economic development of the community. At the same time we strive to improve the quality of life of our workforce and the local community and society generally.

Below are some of the ways in which we have implemented our Community and Social Responsibility aims and commitments:

Support for local community events:

Brewer Harding & Rowe are always looking to support local events within the community. We try and support as many local events as possible such as The Care for Kids 10K Run, The Croyde Ocean Triathlon and the Barnstaple Fringe Theatre Fest and many more to help the charity or organisation in their endeavours to achieve our goal and play our part within the community.

Other local community events we sponsor:

• Bideford Water Festival
• North Devon Show
• Attendance and support regularly for North Devon against Domestic Abuse
• Pilton Green man Festival
• Braunton Village Fair
• Black horse/ Aggi Tug of War

Support for sporting events:

• Sponsorship and support of Barnstaple Rugby Club
• Croyde Ocean Tri - Main sponsor & attendance

Supporting local education:

• Work experience placements in all offices throughout the year - 4 this year
• Petroc - Completion of apprenticeship programme into a permanent role - Yazmin Nicholas, liaison with the college, attendance at review meetings & training
• North Devon Against Domestic Abuse - training undertaken for their helpers by Andrew Woo - family solicitor
• Summer student programme for local Law students & graduates
• Support & Training of College Business student weekly for 22 weeks - Ross Ebbidge
• Attendance at local Careers Fayres – Braunton Academy attended by CS/TW
• Sponsorship of the A Level Law Award at Petroc

Supporting local and national charities:

• Breast Cancer awareness Pink Day - Bideford
• North Devon Hospice – Pitch a pound appeal – all offices
• MacMillan Coffee Mornings in each of the offices
• Parkinsons Disease – purchases of local calendars to support the local support group
• Fundraising in all offices for ‘Over and Above’
• Amigos International – support & correspondence with Rachael @ Kira Farm
• Care for Kids
• Parkinson’s Disease
• Breast Cancer Care
• Families in Grief
• North Devon Cancer & Wellbeing centre
• Movember

Supporting our staff:

As well as helping out the local community, charities and events Brewer Harding & Rowe also like to host social events for staff to promote interaction and create a better working environment and maintain good local links with local businesses and clients.

• Regular staff breakfasts and the Christmas party provide good opportunities for staff to come together, interacting and maintaining good working relationships
• Staff Skittles Nights and Quiz Nights allow staff to get together to eat food, drink and socialise and compete for the various trophies or wooden spoon awards!
• Theatre nights and the BHR film club are regular activities that all staff are invited to.
• All staff are invited to sponsored events to ask if they would like to either become involved in helping with or just attend the event.  Often vouchers are given to staff for free coffee and cake i.e..recent Appledore Regatta and staff are able to obtain car passes to attend the Point to Point events.
• Supporting individual development through our appraisal system for all staff & Fee Earners eg. Tim Watson - ACTAPS, Richard Allin - STEP, Yazmine Nicholas - Apprenticeship
• Supporting staff by keeping in regular contact throughout maternity leave/illness and offering home visits where necessary.

Responsible management of the firm:

This as important part of our policy and we take great care in the areas of:

• health and safety and well-being of our staff and looking after each other
• risk management
• client confidentiality
• conflicts of interest
• money laundering and the prevention of financial crime
• equality and diversity
• Trained sign language staff to aid deaf clients – deaf awareness
• Trained dementia aware staff
• Trained ‘Solicitors for the Elderly’ staff
• Training undertaken in dealing with vulnerable clients
• Ramps supplied to all offices to help disabled clients where disabled access is limited
• Introduction of ground floor interview room in Bideford this year
• Mental Health training to all management dealing with HR
• Home visits undertaken during sickness where/when needed
• Appointments offered outside the office for staff with mental health issues
• Keeping staff involved whilst absent due to sickness/maternity leave
• Retirement books sourced to help older staff plan for the future
• Referral to outside agencies where needed eg. private mental health assessments, reports to help us & employees to endeavour to return to the workplace. Continued support available to all staff where/when needed
• Law Care information given to staff with problems at home and one to one meetings offered
• Local agency information and referrals to the correct agencies given
• Where family problems/abuse arises - referral to one of our solicitors to help

Environmentally aware:

We try to be as environmentally friendly as possible in how we run our business. At all of our offices this includes:

• recycling of paper, magazines and junk mail, including shredding
• recycling of cardboard
• recycling of plastic and reduction of its use where possible eg drinks cups
• recycling of glass
• recycling of printer cartridges
• support local recycling companies such as Perrys Recycling & Coastal Waste
• Attendance at sustainability training
• Sourcing Green energy quotes to supply all offices
• alternative means of data storage on disc and not paper
• email communication where possible
• purchasing sustainably produced products where possible
• trading with eco-friendly companies to recycle our printer cartridges and provide us with environmentally considered equipment. This year we are consolidating all our branch offices to use HP. In the past we have also used Citrus Digital and Printeco Greensource Solutions who provide us with certificates for trees planted in the local area to assist in putting back what we take out, or for contributing to the money they have raised for chosen charities.