Background to the Challenge
The decision for the family to get involved stemmed from a desire as a family to show solidarity for ‘Make poverty History’ campaign, in a way that was appropriate to them. In taking part the Hill family fulfilled their personal and family objectives, showing their support and using this as an opportunity to educate and raise awareness as a family of the plight of others. This was profoundly underlined in the experience that they shared afterwards attending the Murrayfield Live8 concert at the personal invitation of Sir Bob Geldof. In 24 hours, the children were taught in a real and tangible way about a body of ordinary people working together to make a difference, better than many hours of classroom education.
However, reflecting on the experience the family felt
disappointed that the sailing community, many of whom sail across the
channel regularly, as a whole showed little support for this initiative.
The sailing conditions that weekend were not ideal and this discouraged
most of the sailing community from taking part (74 boats registered to
take part). Despite the weather, four boats successfully made the crossing.
The Hill family propose to challenge themselves to sail around the UK in 50 days and in doing so plan to challenge the boating community to show their support and solidarity for the ‘Global Make Poverty History’ campaign, by raising awareness, and as much money as possible for charity. Make Poverty History was a campaign specially formed to target the G8 summit in 2005. Make Poverty History as we know it is no longer in operation. The global campaign to put an end to poverty is now headed by an organisation called GCAP (The Global Call to action Against Poverty) who are championing the ‘Month of Mobilisation’ (16th Sept – 16th Oct) and Global White Band Day (17th October)
Read more about the charities and organisations involved in this project here.