In June 2014 The Friends were honoured with the Queen's Award for Voluntary Service 2014.
This unique UK national honour was created over a decade ago by Her Majesty to mark the Golden Jubilee in 2002 and to recognise the outstanding contributions made to local communities by groups of volunteers. It has an equivalent status for voluntary groups as the MBE has for individuals. The Friends were one of only 111 groups to receive this recognition and the only one from Warwickshire this year.
Juliet Starkey, General Manager at St Cross, said “The Friends give fantastic support to the staff at the hospital and their donations have made a clear difference to the patient experience in St Cross. There is not an operational department in the hospital that has not at some time benefited from a donation from the Friends and so I was pleased to nominate them for this national recognition.”