National Volunteer Week 2022: A letter from our president

April 22, 2022
Jean-Guy Soulière
Federal Retirees’ president has a message of thanks for our team of volunteers — and for all volunteers — during National Volunteer Week 2022.
 

Can you imagine what would have happened during the past two plus years without volunteers? Do you think that Canada would have been as successful as it has been in dealing with wave after wave of this virus? Did you do any volunteering yourself? Helping the front-line workers; calling friends or older persons to see if they were safe; driving people who needed a ride to get their COVID-19 vaccines; baby-sitting your grandchildren when schools were closed; seeing that your neighbours were OK; helping out in a soup kitchen; and, more recently, participating in helping in any way you can in relation to the awful situation in Ukraine. Volunteering has many facets and, for all those who volunteer, celebrate your week. You are important to Canada, and volunteering is worth billions of dollars to our economy. The work you do makes you a contributor to improving the lives of many of our fellow Canadians, especially our most vulnerable. The National Association of Federal Retirees could not survive without its volunteers.

To many of us, volunteering is and has always been an important part of our lives, from participating in our kids’ activities when they were growing up, to giving time to our communities as adults or participating in charitable organizations. For those of you who have not volunteered yet, know that the rewards of volunteering are many, including knowing we are contributing to the society that has given us so much.

Happy National Volunteer Week!

Jean-Guy Soulière