December 2011
PLAY YOUR PART IN CELEBRATION OF CAMBRIDGESHIRE BUSINESS
Companies of all types and sizes are being invited to play their part in Cambridge Awards Week, a major initiative to raise the profile of Cambridgeshire businesses and promote the area as a great place to work and do business.
Science Park Granta Park is spearheading promotion of the week, which takes place from 19-23 March 2012. Working with key business representatives including One Nucleus, Cambridge Wireless and Cambridge Network, Granta Park will be helping to promote business success in Cambridgeshire during the week when the Cambridge News and the Business Weekly business awards are taking place. This will include a website www.cambridgeawardsweek.co.uk, which launches this week. Companies will be able to use this to promote their own activities and success stories during the week as well as find out about the many events taking place to promote Cambridgeshire businesses. In addition, events will be promoted through local, regional, national and international media including Twitter and Facebook.
Says Granta Park’s Roz Bird: “It is great that the two major business awards have decided to co-ordinate their awards evenings. There is now an opportunity for us all to work together to create further events and initiatives in that week with the aim of raising awareness of the dynamics of the Cambridgeshire business community including recognising business success and the achievements of entrepreneurial business leaders. We’re therefore encouraging businesses throughout Cambridgeshire to contribute in their own way and play their part in a week of celebrations that offers an unmissable opportunity.”
Already putting their weight behind the event are networking groups Cambridge Network, Cambridge Wireless and One Nucleus. Says Harriet Fear, CEO of One Nucleus, the membership organisation for international life science and healthcare companies based at Granta Park: "One Nucleus is delighted to be a partner of the Cambridge Awards Week. Cambridge is a global hub for life sciences and healthcare - a natural beacon and the Awards week celebration of excellence highlights this excellence ever more.”
Says Dr. Soraya Jones, CEO of Cambridge Wireless, a network of companies interested in the application of wireless technologies, who will be holding a User Experience SIG (special interest group) during the Awards Week on 22 March: "We are delighted to be working with Granta Park, One Nucleus , Cambridge Network and other partners for the Cambridge Awards week. It is an opportunity to showcase the innovative developments taking place in Cambridge. This can only be a good thing for our community of companies within Cambridge Wireless.”
For Granta Park the awards are extension of the work that it continues to do to create a special science community within the park and beyond. At Granta Park events include senior team lunches, poster events and offering its meeting and conference facilities free of charge to start-up companies that need to meet up with potential investors and partners. This year Granta Park also hosted a visit from the Governor of Massachusetts with a delegation of business representatives.
To find out more about Cambridge Awards Week visit www.cambridgeawardsweek.co.uk
September 2011
CAMYOGA CELEBRATES WITH MASS CHANTING ON PARKERS PIECE
Camyoga, Cambridge’s only dedicated yoga centre, will be celebrating its first anniversary and the start of autumn with a mass chant in praise of the sun on Parkers Piece on Saturday 24 September at 2 pm.
Anyone is invited to the event, which will include 108 rounds of the gayatri mantra chant, a 24 syllable Hindu chant and prayer to the sun that is said to inspire increased wisdom and spiritual growth and development. It is traditionally chanted at three different times of day with the maximum benefit said to come from chanting it 108 times. Its meaning is " "May our intellect be illuminated to lead us along the righteous path".
Says Camyoga founder Louise Palmer: “This event is a celebration of a wonderful year for Camyoga in which we hope we have brought spiritual growth and development to many people in their busy and stressful lives. This gives us an opportunity to reflect on this as well as marking the end of the summer. We hope many people will take time out of their busy Saturdays for just a few moments of reflection.”
The Camyoga centre opened in September at Thomas House, 14 George IV Street, CB2 1HH, just off Hills Road, Cambridge, since when it has run more than 50 classes a week from beginners’ through to classes for expert yogis along with specialist workshops at weekends from some of the UK’s best yoga teachers. It has two studios, one dedicated to Hot Yoga, Ashtanga, Vinyasa and Jivamukti classes and the other featuring classic Hatha yoga, Pilates, pre and postnatal yoga, mother and baby classes and kids’ yoga.
For more information about the chant and Camyoga visit www.camyoga.co.uk, tel 01223 524587 or email info@camyoga.co.uk.
DON’T LET YOUR LIVING WILL BE A LIVING NIGHTMARE
With the media full of stories of hospitals being accused of putting do not resuscitate orders in patients’ notes without permission and a woman resorting tattooing ‘do not resuscitate’ on her chest , a Living Will might seem like the best option. But even these need to be carefully thought through says Luck Luck Ooi from Barr Ellison Solicitors.
“Living Wills is a catch all for what are two distinct types of legal document: an Advance Decision to Refuse Treatment and an Advance Statement,” says Luck. “While both are to do with making your wishes known should you lose the capacity or ability to communicate them yourself an Advance Decision to Refuse Treatment is legally binding and specifies the treatments not wanted and under what circumstance this will apply and an Advance Statement is non legally binding and is merely a document setting out your wishes as to the type of care you would like to receive.”
However, warns Luck, people shouldn’t assume that because they have made an Advance Decision everything will be as they want it to be when they time comes. There are certain circumstances where it might not be legally binding, including some set out in the Mental Capacity Act 2005, such as where there are reasonable grounds to support the fact that the maker of the Advance Decision did not think of the type of situation that he or she is in at the time of making the Advance Decision, such as (any example?). In addition, the decisions can be over ridden if the particular treatment and the circumstances surrounding it are not specified in the Advance Decision or if the person who made it then gives power of attorney to someone under a health and welfare Lasting Power of Attorney.
“The decision to make an Advance Decision is a very personal one that should be considered at length,” advises Luck. “And once made it can’t just be forgotten as it needs to be reviewed regularly to keep on top of advances in medical treatments available. It is also advisable to lodge a certified copy of the document with your GP (subject to them agreeing to this) and writing to the GP once a year to confirm that the Advance Decision created is still valid and current.”
If you change your mind though there is no legal requirement for the withdrawal of an Advance Decision to be in writing. “However, should you change your mind after making an Advance Decision, then it is certainly advisable to destroy the document along with all copies of it, inform your GP and contact any party that may have a copy of it so that there can be no confusion,” adds Luck.
Luck Luck Ooi is a member of the Wills, Probate, Gifts, Trusts & Inheritance Tax team at Barr Ellison and can be contacted on 01223 417200, l.ooi@barrellison.co.uk www.barrellison.co.uk
HOTEL MANAGER DONATES TO CHARITY SHOP CLOSE TO HIS HEART
A Cambridge hotel manager who received life saving heart surgery as a child has donated 14 bedrooms’ worth of furniture following a refurbishment to Cambridge’s new British Heart Foundation Furniture & Electrical Store with the aim of helping other heart patients.
Roderick Watson, General Manger at Best Western The Gonville Hotel received the treatment at The Birmingham Children’s Hospital at the age of 11 and has supported he charity ever since: “I had a pioneering operation and now thanks to the British Heart Foundation many more people have been helped since. It was fortuitous that at the time we were refurbishing our rooms the charity was looking for quality furniture for the store. I hope our donation will help other heart patients just as I was helped and i would urge other businesses to do the same thing.”
The British Heart Foundation Furniture & Electrical Store opens in East Road Cambridge on Tuesday 23 August and is one of 40 the charity will be opening this year. “Our retail division relies almost entirely upon voluntary donations, so this support from Best Western The Gonville Hotel is greatly appreciated,” said Area Manger Jacqui Whitehall. “The money raised from the donation will help raise funds for pioneering heart research, innovations into patient care, life saving treatments and specialist heart nurses. One suite of furniture for example can fund a life enhancing heart monitor for a patient.”
The charity’s retail outlets raised £26m last year.
The Best Western Gonville Hotel is located in Cambridge’s historic city centre overlooking Parkers Piece. Facilities include 80 comfortable ensuite bedrooms with wi-fi access, restaurant, bar and conference, meeting and wedding facilities. It also has extensive parking. It has refurbished 50 rooms over the past year, each incorporating the latest carbon efficient air conditioning, modern styling and wet rooms.