The Royal Arch Banquet has been fortunate, due to the extremely generous support it has received from those that annually attend our function, which enables us to make sizeable donations to very worthy and needy causes.

This year, donations were made to:
Northern Oesophago-gastric Cancer fund.
Prostate Cancer Research.
Child Action North West.
Trafford Domestic Abuse.
Dementia UK.
It’s perhaps more poignant that the largest donation, of £5,000.00 to The Christie, was made in memory of the late EComp Paul MA Rose PGSwdBr   PastDepGSupt………
A Freemason who shall be very much missed by us all and who carried out an enormous amount of sterling work and successfully accomplished so many significant projects for the Province of East Lancashire.
In making the donation, arrangements were made by Louise Dawson, the Community Fundraising Officer of the The Christie Charitable Trust, so that EComp Martin Roche PGStB  DepGSupt and EComp Harvey Basger PAGSoj  2nd ProvGPr could meet with Juan Valle, Professor and Honorary Consultant in Medical Oncology.
Presenting the cheque to Professor Valle was most appropriate as he was the Consultant that treated Paul Rose, although sadly in this case Paul’s Cancer was far too advanced.
Professor Valle’s specialities are Cancers of the pancreas, biliary tract (cholangiocarcinoma and gallbladder cancer), liver and neuroendocrine tumours.
The goal of Professor Valle’s team is focused on clinical and translational research in cholangiocarcinoma and other Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary tumours. They aim to understand clinical characteristics of patients with cholangiocarcinoma and develop new options of treatment. Professor Valle’s team has successfully changed practice in cholangiocarcinoma by participating in national and international clinical trials.
The Professor’s team collaborates closely other teams and scientists throughout the world.
A significant challenge is understanding that “cholangiocarcinoma” may, in fact, include a number of different diseases which behave differently one to another. How to study different sub-groups of patients in a disease that is already rare will remain a challenge.
The £5,000.00 donation was gratefully received and will indeed be faithfully applied. It is going towards a specific form of cancer for which there is no separate charity or charitable funding.
Once again I wish to offer my sincere thanks, on behalf of the DepGSupt and the organising committee of The Royal Arch Banquet, to all those that attend in support of our annual event and for the very generous manner in which that support translates into extremely worthwhile charitable acts.
We hope to see you again, at The Royal Arch Banquet, on Saturday the 13th June 2020.

Harvey Basger,  PAGSoj    2ndProvGPr.