It’s Evans Above At The Irish Volunteer Awards 2025

Rodney & Audrey Evans at The Carlton Hotel SAT6DEC25

aking place in The Carlton Hotel last night, this year’s Volunteer Ireland Awards delivered a double-whammy for Greystones.

For Rodney and Audrey Evans were given the Social Inclusion & Community Support 2025 gong.

And rightly so.

The award was in recognition of the Killincarrig couple’s exceptional volunteerism and dedication to Tiglin, the Greystones-based charity all about restoring lives affected by homelessness, addiction and social exclusion.

Every Thursday, without fail, Rodney and Audrey head into the charity’s homeless café, The Lighthouse, which boasts not only hot meals on the menu but also pathways to recovery and stability.

As Audrey says, “The Lighthouse is not a soup kitchen. It is about meeting people in their need.”

And the Evans couple have been meeting people in their need for 20 years now. For Rodney, it means pushing a trolley full of dinners along by the Liffey and back to Pearse Street, as they feed the homeless sleeping rough on Dublin’s streets.

Given his years running Rodney Evans Motors – now taken over by three of his sons – it was perhaps inevitable that the man’s first encounter with Tiglin was mechanical, looking after the engine of the No Bucks Café bus that would serve sandwiches to the homeless throughout Dublin. A DAF with a petrol generator, for any curious bus fans out there.

The Evans clan at The Carlton

And over the many ensuing years, there are those the couple have helped get off the streets who are now living happy and productive lives, and often swing by the Evans home to say hello. And thank you.

As to how long the octogenarian angels will continue their Thursday night vocation, Rodney quips, “We will keep going until we drop…“

You can find out more about Tiglin’s Lighthouse Café here, and check out our 2022 ramble chat with Rodney right here.