The East Midlands Chamber Business Awards highlight and celebrate the success of businesses across Nottinghamshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire. This year’s awards have a particular focus on the ways businesses have adapted and overcome adversity due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
The Excellence in Collaboration award is presented to organisations who have worked together for a common goal and combined their skills to demonstrate what can be achieved by working together. Rothera Bray put itself forward for this award based on its collaboration with Derbyshire Carers Association to provide free legal clinics to the organisation’s service users and staff. The clinics, which are normally offered face to face and have helped nearly 400 carers access legal advice, have been adapted during the pandemic and subsequent lockdowns to be offered by phone or video call, to ensure that service users can still easily access this support and advice.
Deborah Gough, Operational Director at Derbyshire Carers Association said:
“The legal clinics have enabled carers to access professional advice on various issues connected to their caring roles for free. We have accessed information and help with power of attorney, housing, Will making, issues with social care and health settings, along with any other legal issues carers needed advice on.
“The team have been able to explain things to carers by unwrapping the legal jargon, helping carers with their rights all in a setting conducive to carers, either face to face in their local Carers Centre, over the phone or on occasions where needed, a domiciliary visit. It has been a lifeline when things have been really challenging. The worry and fears have been resolved very promptly and in a supportive way.”
After submitting our application for the award in May, the firm was announced as a finalist on 29th June. Rothera Bray will take part in a virtual judging panel on Thursday 15th July along with the three other finalists in the Excellence in Collaboration category to talk about the application and collaboration before the judges decide on the winner, which will be announced at the Gala Dinner in November.
Adam Cotterill, an Associate Solicitor in the Wills and probate department who runs the clinics with Derbyshire Carers Association said:
“We are thrilled that our work with Derbyshire Carers Association has been shortlisted in the Excellence in Collaboration category at the 2021 East Midlands Chamber Business Awards.
“We have developed a fantastic working relationship with Derbyshire Carers Association over the years and it has been a pleasure being able to assist carers and the people they care for by offering them access to free legal advice that they otherwise may not have been able to obtain.”
