“Red Cross is a way of life”
15 June 2026
With close to 50 years’ service between them, one dynamic couple are unwavering pillars of New Zealand Red Cross in Whanganui. They’ve held key leadership roles, responded to emergencies, and inspired a strong Red Cross volunteer base and community activities in Whanganui.
Trudy and Lindsay Taylor were each awarded a Meritorious Service Award and Honorary Life Membership in the New Zealand Red Cross 2025 National Honours and Awards in November. These honours celebrate their many roles – from branch and area leadership to volunteer advocacy and emergency management expertise – as well as their significant community impact.
"It is an absolute honour and quite humbling to receive these awards as there are a lot of good people out there doing a lot of good things – we're only a small part of it," Trudy says, dedicating their awards to all the Red Cross people who contributed to the efforts the Taylors have been part of. “Red Cross is a little way for us to give. After 30 years, it’s become part of me.”
Lindsay adds: “Plus, we've met some great people and made some very good, lifelong friends.”
Always ready to serve
Trudy’s New Zealand Red Cross involvement began in 1995 with the Response Team (a precursor to today’s Disaster Welfare and Support Team or DWST), where she served as team leader and training officer. She finished with the team only two years ago.
“I got involved when my children were very young as I was looking for something to do that was hands-on, helpful to the community, and that would provide some stimulation away from the children,” Trudy says with a chuckle.
Soon she was balancing volunteering alongside full-time work as a paramedic at St John (now Hato Hone St John), and raising three children. In the years since Trudy has held every committee role in the Whanganui Branch, served on the East-West Area Council, and worked as a Red Cross first aid instructor.
Trudy has also worked in national emergency operations centre teams, with deployments to the 2011 Christchurch and 2016 Kaikōura earthquakes – serving as first field operations manager in Kaikōura – along with the 2013 Raetihi water crisis, the 2015 Whanganui floods, and the 2016 Hawke’s Bay gastroenteritis outbreak, among others.
"Working in Kaikōura, in particular, was a surreal experience. It was a big job, but it was really satisfying too,” she says. “Deployments were always rewarding as we knew we were actually making a real difference out there.”
Lindsay's involvement began in 1996 supporting team training in his job as a firefighter with what is now Fire and Emergency New Zealand. This led to formal Red Cross roles from 2008, including Whanganui branch president, treasurer, and three years as East-West Area Council Chair. He has advised national steering committees and exercises, has bridged Red Cross and the fire service during the 2011 Christchurch earthquake response, and has helped with the Cyclone Gabrielle recovery in 2023.
“From national exercises to deployments, I've valued being able to give honest input that gets implemented – it shows how much influence local volunteers can have,” he says.
The Taylors’ efforts have also included providing fire ground catering with psychological first aid for responders, creating safe spaces for people to share their grief or stories, and small acts of kindness such as digging a backyard toilet for an elderly man or escorting residents to their first shower in days in post-quake Christchurch.
“Sometimes it's just the smallest things that make you realise the organisation you're a part of and the impact it has,” Trudy says.
The book shop chapter
Since 2013, the pair have been pivotal in establishing a thriving second-hand bookshop in Whanganui to raise funds for Red Cross. Trudy, as its coordinator, has doubled turnover in the last three years, while Lindsay is the shop’s "Mr Fix-it".
"Volunteers must come to have a laugh and enjoy what they're doing," Trudy emphasises, noting the shop runs like clockwork even in their absence.
Family and the future
For a time, Red Cross work spanned four generations for the Taylors, with Trudy encouraging her father, Bruce Kennedy, to get involved with the branch, and bringing their children along to act as patients in training exercises. Eventually all their children became DWST volunteers, while a granddaughter helped in the bookshop for a time too.
The couple say their work highlights the community’s profound trust in the Red Cross symbol: "People will often look for the Red Cross. They see you in uniform and know you are there to help," Trudy notes.
Now focused on mentoring successors and fundraising for community resilience and youth engagement, the pair remain steadfast.
“Red Cross to us is a way of life,” Trudy says. “It's a passion too. We admire the Red Cross principles and what the organisation stands for and the work that it does. And that's really what keeps us going.”
More information
Learn more about our work in emergencies
Find a Red Cross volunteer role near you
Learn more about honours and awards at New Zealand Red Cross