Ex England Captain Gill Burns MBE raises funds for Wooden Spoon

Ex England Captain, ex President of the RFUW, immediate Past President of Lancashire and member of the Merseyside Regional Committee Gill Burns MBE, recently donated £1,167.45 to Wooden Spoon after a few fundraising activities. 

Gill arranged a raffle in her capacity as Lancashire President at the annual Lancashire RFU awards dinner and she raised some more from her public speaking engagements where she speaks to various groups about her life in rugby, free of charge, but collects money for Wooden Spoon in lieu of a speakers fee. 

Some of the Pioneers in their honours caps

However the bulk of the donation came from the Women’s Rugby Community after the sales of their regional and divisional honours caps and their huge gathering at the England v Ireland Six Nations Game at Leicester in April. 

Gill with her friends from the North West Region, the North East Region and the North Division.

Gill organised the caps for the women who played representative rugby in England in the days when they funded everything themselves before they were part of the RFU. All the pioneers were invited to sit together at the game and created a huge wall of colour as they proudly wore their honours caps. 

Gill being interviewed after the game

Gill commented ‘Having something tangible to represent all that the pioneers did to help grow the women’s game is really important.  There were almost 400 old girls gathered at Leicester and all very much enjoyed the occasion. Not only did we have a fabulous six nations fixture to watch but we also met up with many old friends, made some new ones and even enjoyed a good old fashioned sing-song too. It was a magical day for everyone and the fact that we raised some money for such a good cause made it even better. Wooden Spoon is such a great charity and everyone was happy to help support’