THE newly formed Acle Community First Responders group has received an unexpected donation from a local couple.Maureen and Morris May from Stokesby, recently celebrated their golden wedding anniversary and instead of gifts, they asked for donations for the local Responder group, and raised more than £300.

THE newly formed Acle Community First Responders group has received an unexpected donation from a local couple.

Maureen and Morris May from Stokesby, recently celebrated their golden wedding anniversary and instead of gifts, they asked for donations for the local Responder group, and raised more than £300.

First responder Peter Upton said: “We are extremely grateful for this very generous donation. Our group has only been formed a few weeks and this money will help make a real difference to our service. Combined with other donations from Acle and Upton Parish Councils, we will now be able to begin purchasing our training equipment, which is not funded by the ambulance service.”

Community First Responders are volunteers who are specially trained to support the ambulance service, by attending emergency calls in their local area, where time can make a difference between life and death. They are alerted at the same time as the ambulance crew, but being local, they can often arrive ahead of the ambulance, and begin life saving procedures.

To increase the limited cover they currently offer, the group badly needs additional volunteers, even if they can only spare a few hours per week. Anyone interested should telephone Peter Upton on 01493 751123

Maureen and Morris are pictured presenting a cheque of £320 to Peter Upton and Brian Jones from the Community First Responders.