Report From District 1040 Conference 2025
Held at the Spa, Scarborough on 3rd and 4th October 2025
District 1040 Conference at the Spa in Scarborough was opened by District Governor Anne Sutcliffe who emphasised the role of Rotary in promoting youth projects. She spoke about Louth Interact clubs link with a club in the USA, the role of Rotakids, the Rotary Youth Leadership scheme, Ocean Youth Trust all of which will be our legacy for the future
Our second speaker was Jennifer Angus of Inner Wheel who spoke about the Orange the World campaign.This is a United Nations world campaign to stop violence against women and girls.
The signature colour of the campaign is orange. As a bright and optimistic colour, orange represents a future free from violence against women and girls.
Next up District Governor led a discussion on the benefits of the youth programmes. On the panel was Bianca who recently completed a masters degree in peace studies at the Rotary Peace Centre at Bradford University. She said that she had gained a great deal for the Rotary sponsored course with a greater understanding of the need for empathy in creating peace.
The three other students had all recently taken part in the Rotary Youth Leaders course. All spoke of how it had improved their confidence and self belief, even if the early morning starts were a challenge
Our next speaker at the District 1040 conference was Mat Everett from Bradford Park Avenue football club who spoke about the Rotary Kickback scheme. Bradford PA came into contact with Rotary as they became a corporate member and from that a scheme was developed to give safe spaces for kids in Bradford by providing drop in football for teenagers.
They now have five venues supporting groups of up to 50 children
The final speaker of session 1 was Amy Meek who spoke about the Kids against Plastic that she started with her sister when she was a young teenager. She emphasised that the world only has five years left to meet the targets set by the UN environmental targets to control globall warming
From initial litter picking targets the charity has expanded to work with schools. This has been supported by other Rotary districts with X Kap:Action for Change pledging to support meaningful environmental change through Plastic Clever and Action Against awards - connecting with schools
The speaker at the start of the second session of our conference was Jane Walker on the Purple Community Fund
A few years ago Jane was shocked to see pictures of children in the Philippines scavenging through rubbish tips to find items to sell to survive
The charity has now developed programmes to educate the children to take them away from the life of no hope.
More details can be found on their website including a TED talk that Jane has given
Ann Percival then spoke about the Schools Consent Project that is running in schools in Harrogate funded by local Rotary clubs
This charity provides speakers to go into schools. The speakers are all lawyers who have the authority to talk to students about how important having consent in any sexual relationship. They talk about sending intimate pictures and how senders and receivers are breaking the law. The talks are aimed at year 9 and 10 students.
More information https://www.schoolsconsentproject.com/
Christine Beal spoke about My Mito Mission. She suffered the loss of her daughter to mitochondrial disease. This disease can be inherited or occur spontaneously. There is no current cure and will lead to the death of the individual Following the loss of her daughter Christine set up the My Mito Mission charity which supports families affected by this disease as well as raising funds for research
More details on their website https://www.mymitomission.uk/
Our first key note speaker the Rev Kate Bottley
Kate gave a very entertaining talk outlining the events in her life taking her first into the church and then into TV and the media via Gogglebox!
The first speaker after lunch at the District 1040 was Val Howe on Coats4Kids.
Coats4Kids is a volunteer led charity that identified that in the UK there are one million primary school children living in poverty whose parents aren’t able to provide good coats for the children to go to school with.
They have developed a voucher system which through schools are given to children via their parents. The vouchers can then be used on the charity’s website to get a coat for their child at no cost.
Each coat costs £25 - Rotary clubs have provided much of the funds to the charity to purchase the coats. This year the charity is supplying over 10,000 coats
The Dolly Parton Imagination Library was the topic of our next speaker Janet Appleton from Aireborough Rotary Club
This scheme provides books to primary school age children. The project has been running in district for several years initially through Cleethorpes RC and now through Aireborough - over 50000 books have been given to children in the district and over 278 million throughout the world
Fiona Burrel from Alzheimer’s Research UK spoke about the devastation that early onset Alzheimers can cause. She highlighted the family of Jordan and Cian Adams who lost their mum to the disease and have now found that they too carry the genes that means they too will get the disease. Their response has been to devote a huge amount of time and courage to fundraise for the charity.
Fiona will come to clubs to give talks about the charity and its work
District 1040 runs two disability games - the Humber Maritime Rotary Games and in Yorkshire Rotary Accessible Games Leeds. DG Ann spoke to Bill Lennox about the Hull Games and Anne Griffin about the YRAG
The second key note speaker was Christa Ackroyd. She spoke passionately about her life and the forces that over the years have shaped her. She overcame misogyny as a young reporter working on the Yorkshire Ripper case and later when working in TV. As a journalist she believes in getting the facts correct and avoiding sensationalism. A strong advocate for young people she helped secure the Bronte birthplace as an inspiring place for future generations using the slogan “Be More Bronte”
She emphasised that in the current age of social media Rotary needs to shout more about what we do. “Be More Christa”