The annual campaign launched today and is the Royal British Legion’s biggest fundraising event.
The appeal will see poppies and pins available from every parish hall and a pop-up poppy shop will be open at 51 King Street – the site of the former Beghins shoe store – selling Royal British Legion merchandise.
With the current Covid-19 restrictions, volunteers will not be able to distribute poppies in person at various locations, as is normally the case. Instead, silhouette Tommy soldiers will be standing to attention at Waitrose and Co-op stores to help raise funds for the Legion.
A restricted service was due to begin at 1pm today to mark the launch of the appeal and was due to be attended by the Bailiff, Timothy Le Cocq, and the Lieutenant-Governor, Air Chief Marshal Sir Stephen Dalton, among others. The ceremony was due be held at the Great War memorial opposite the Cenotaph in St Helier to help ensure physical distancing could be maintained.
Sir Stephen and Lady Dalton said they intended to visit the poppy shop after the service.
Poppy Appeal organiser Alison Opfermann said the pandemic had caused things to ‘look a little different this year’, with many of the usual fundraising activities not taking place.
‘The Chelsea Pensioners who usually join us won’t be flying over this year, and we can’t host our usual coffee mornings,’ she added. ‘We have chosen a prominent location on the high street for the pop-up shop and we hope this will attract support from the public. We are delighted that His Excellency and Lady Dalton will be visiting our volunteers at the shop.’
The Poppy Appeal shop will also feature paintings by the late Peter Utley, a Jersey veteran who survived the Normandy Campaign in 1944 and also fought in Holland and Germany.
Commenting on the preparations, welfare chairman for the Royal British Legion Keith Sunter said: ‘Covid has been a very challenging situation. But we wanted to make this the best we could – this is our once-a-year appeal and everyone in the Legion has put in tremendous work behind the scenes to make sure we are ready. The parish hall and Poppy Appeal teams have been absolutely brilliant.’
Mr Sunter reminded Islanders that they could also donate to the cause online by going to rbl.je. Poppy tins and boxes will also have QR codes for smartphone users to scan, which will link straight to the fundraising website.
