Our purpose is to provide opportunities for individuals from every walk of life
What We Do
At The Daimler Foundation, our purpose is to provide opportunities for individuals from every walk of life. We use our premises, and our ponies and horses, to raise the educational attainments; life-skills and employability skills; well-being and life aspirations of people of all ages who have experienced disadvantage.
We facilitate individual growth and development through a range of programmes and opportunities.
Naturally, as well as our equine therapies, employability, training and other programmes, we provide opportunities for all to participate in equestrian activities.
Although our main focus is equestrian, other sports are supported too.
Our goal is to make our services and programmes accessible to any individual regardless of ability or financial circumstances.
The Daimler Foundation works to encourage FREEDOM to remove barriers to participating in equestrian sport – a sport that can enrich the lives of everyone who participates at whatever level.
Our current services include:
Equine Therapy | Employability, Education & Training | 1-1 Work | Working with disadvantaged individuals and groups across Mental Health, Criminal Justice, Drug & Alcohol Rehabilitation and Refugees & Asylum Seekers | Sports Development: young people, individuals and teams.
Brief History
The Daimler Foundation came from the work we did with challenged individuals: groups and organisations who recognised the healing power of horses and ponies, would ask if they could bring people along to meet our horses and ponies.
Out of those initial requests grew our equine therapy programmes and, from there, employability and other training programmes seemed a natural second step.
After that, came our move to a becoming a charity, which we did in 2019.
Why the Daimler Foundation?
The Foundation was named after Daimler: Daimler’s own story underlies all we do at the Foundation. Today he’s a happy and, we think, contented individual who has found his purpose in life after overcoming many challenges along the way.
Born into a challenging environment, Daimler’s early life experience meant he felt the whole world was against him. Misunderstood and mis-directed, Daimler developed his own demons and lashed out at the world.
Through a lot of hard work, saintly levels of patience, a supportive environment that allowed Daimler to develop his talents and – crucially – someone believing in him, he’s become a very successful multi-discipline competition horse. Of course, there are days when the demons strike back – on those days, we shrug, accept him for what he is and say ‘That’s Daimler for you’.
Daimler’s story is what inspires us: while he’s a horse, his life-experience mirrors that of many of our service users – and that’s why we named the Foundation after him.
Objectives
The Daimler Foundation’s Objectives are:
- To provide relief for those in need by reason of ill-health or disability by providing therapeutic riding sessions to people with both development and physical disabilities.
- To encourage the public participation in riding as a sport and recreational activity, to promote good fellowship amongst riders and to improve and maintain the standard of riding and horsemanship.
- To promote the welfare of horses in need of care.
This is done by:
- Organising instructional meetings, lectures and competitive events and other activities.
- Encouraging young and old people to take part in horse activities; giving them the opportunity to learn to ride a horse and benefit from this therapeutic activity and to support this activity by ensuring they can learn in a pleasant, safe and supportive environment.
- Promoting community participation in healthy recreation involving the horse.
- Promoting the prevention of cruelty, neglect or harm to horses and promoting the relief, safety, sanctuary, rescue and welfare of horses in need of care.
Ambassador Programme
The Daimler Foundation Ambassador Programme was set up to recognise the contribution which key individuals play in enhancing the success of the Foundation. The individuals have been chosen to represent the Foundation due to their positive attitude towards the sport.
Our current Ambassadors are Gemma Greenway and Scott McLellan.
Information required here on the Ambassadors themselves and what the programme does