Canary Islands resident wins Age In Spain’s Good Neighbour Award

From a strong field of finalists in the 2023/4 Good Neighbour Award run by Age in Spain, an overall winner has been announced, and she lives in Fuerteventura. She is the first person from the Canary Islands to be nominated and to win the award. And a second woman has also received commendation in the scheme. Both are connected to an association that provides vital services to non-Spanish residents on Fuerteventura.

The Good Neighbour Award sets out to highlight the best examples of neighbourliness in Spain. In some cases, nominees for the award are people who have done something really significant for their local community; in other cases, grateful neighbours simply want to say thank you to someone who has done them a kindness or gone out of their way to help.

This year’s winner is Alison Brophy, of Corralejo, Fuerteventura, nominated for creating ‘Stronger Together’, an organisation which exists for the benefit of non-Spanish residents, simply, she says, ‘to help people, to improve things, to help the nationalities integrate and generally to improve the life of everyone in Fuerteventura’. 

Alison has lived in Spain for 27 years. She first arrived to buy a karaoke bar (which she still runs) but became interested in helping people during the COVID lockdown when ‘time presented itself and I wanted to do something to help’. Since then, thousands of people have come for advice or support, evidenced by the large number of nominations she received.

‘There are so many people needing help here and no one to help them, and what professional help there is can be very costly. Right now, we have a membership of 650, among whom 26 nationalities are represented.’

Stronger Together aims to integrate people into Spanish society by providing language lessons, facilitating social activity, and encouraging people to register to vote in local elections; it navigates bureaucracy and helps people with their TIEs, their driving licences, or their business start-ups. The association arranges care packages when needed, accompanies people for hospital visits, and also liaises with consulates, government bodies and other charitable organisations. It also produces Breeze, the only English language magazine on the island and for which Alison has secured sponsorship from local businesses.

Not content with all of that, Alison has another idea, what she calls her big dream. She’d like to build an assisted living complex for the island and is in search of a business backer for that.

‘I know there’s a market for this and it’s a real business opportunity for someone. Right now, we have to send people home to the UK if they are looking for assisted living facilities because there is no full-time care on the island.’

Commenting on the announcement of the Good Neighbour Award winners, UK Ambassador to Spain, Hugh Elliott, said:

“Stronger Together is a respected organisation in Fuerteventura and has worked with the Las Palmas Consulate to provide support to the most vulnerable of British people. My very warmest congratulations go to Alison Brophy and all those commended by Age in Spain for their good neighbourliness.”

“It can be tough integrating into a new country and navigating different systems, but all those recognised by this award make a real difference in their local communities, helping to make day-to-day life just that bit easier for others. I applaud all these wonderful local ambassadors for the UK in Spain.”

Amongst those receiving special commendation in the awards scheme, was Alison’s friend Elaine Berry, who is President of Stronger Together and helped Alison set it up. Elaine has worked with the Spanish courts as a legal translator and has also helped the British Consulate and several holiday tour operators when visitors have met with difficult circumstances while on holiday.

In 2017, she won Jet2’s award for customer service. The skills and expertise that Alison acquired doing this kind of work has been put to good use in Stronger Together. She says she has developed a specialist skill – helping people cope with bereavement, guiding people through all that is involved and arranging funerals, cemetery arrangements, dealing with the banks and with the deceased’s will.

Elaine attributes her involvement with people to her language skills. “I took to Spanish like a duck to water and when you can speak the language, people tend to come and ask you for help. If there are a lot of expats in an area – as at the coastal places on the mainland – then there tend to be more support services. This is less so in the Canary Islands with fewer resident expats.”

“It’s a great honour to receive this acknowledgement and I hope that it helps spread the word and we might find people doing something similar in other parts of Spain.”

Several other commendations were awarded to people living on mainland Spain. For details see www.ageinspain.org.  

Age in Spain is the first national charity in Spain dedicated to the welfare of English-speaking older people. It helps people to live their later life in Spain to the fullest. It is a small independent organisation and depends on voluntary donations to fund its services.