It was good to chat to you on the phone today and I am hoping that the Anglo/Turkish Association will look favourably on helping us with our new initiative. As you may have seen in the press this week the Help Those With Cancer Assocation/Tulips has launched a new initiative to try and encourage ex pats to donate to them direct from their bank accounts, through a standing order each month. I personally, along with my colleague Sue Tilt, have been heavily involved in setting this up.

We have produced a leaflet, a copy of which I have attached. We have so far given this leaflet (which includes a Standing Order form) to all the banks in the Girne area and we will be putting it into a lot more venues that ex pats visit over the coming week. The leaflet explains a lot about what the Help Those With Cancer Association/Tulips is trying to do but below is some information that I feel might be helpful to your Association when you take this to your next committee meeting in September.

I don't know whether you or anyone else at the Anglo/Turkish Association is aware but the fact is that during the last 3 months a few of us have managed to raise just over 65,000TL for Help Those With Cancer Assocation/Tulips, which initially sounds fantastic however the flip side of the coin is that during the same time period we have paid out in excess of 130,000TL towards ex-pat cancer treatment!

Approx 95% of all monies raised by Help Those With Cancer Association/Tulips is actually raised by Turkish Cypriots, with many of them paying via their wages by standing order or voluntary donations. Based on the figures in the paragraph above, you can now understand why we are trying encourage ex-pats to pay regularly by standing order, it can be as little as 5 or 10TL, equally it can be as much as they feel comfortably able to.

Raziye Kocaismail, founder and chairperson of the Help Those With Cancer Association/Tulips, will continue to assist whoever walks through their doors seeking help, irrespective of what nationality they are, but we need to address the substantial difference in what is being received and what is being paid out for the ex-pat's treatment as it is unacceptable that the Turkish Cypriots should continue to fund the cancer care of the ex-pat community.

We are hoping that the Anglo/Turkish Association can work with us to find a way to encourage the ex-pat community to take on this intiative.

If anyone from the Anglo/Turkish Association would like to meet with Raziye Kocaismail, we would be more than happy to make an appointment and introduce that person to Raziye, equally both Sue and myself would be more than happy to make a presentation to your committee so that you are fully aware of all aspects of the Help Those With Cancer Association/Tulips.

If you require any further information you can contact both of us on this email address alternatively you can call me 0533 865 9795.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Kind Regards

Carole King