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LONDONERS of all ages will be receiving much needed support after four good causes secured more than £720,000 from the Big Lottery Fund.

The Lottery support comes from BIG’s Reaching Communities programme - dedicated to improving the lives of local people across England.

Older people in Kensington and Chelsea are enjoying a new lease of life with the help of user-led charity, Open Age, who received a near £140,000 to continue and expand their pioneering activity centre for the over 50s.

Based in a Guinness Trust housing estate, the New Horizons project opened in autumn 2007 and offers a wide variety of physical, mental and social activities for older people across the two boroughs. The centre is maintained and supported by a consortium of three organisations; Open Age, Sixty Plus and the Guinness Trust.

Helen Leech, Director of Open Age, said: “There is a high proportion of older people living on their own in the borough and despite being affluent areas, Kensington and Chelsea are also home to some of the most deprived communities in the country. There are very few facilities for retired people in the area so the centre has been a huge success since it opened in September last year.

“We’ve got a really fantastic building with loads on offer; everything from dance classes, yoga and pilates to art classes, computer classes and regular talks from outside agencies like the CAB and Primary Care Trust. The grant is fantastic news for us and means we can spend more time on outreach work, encouraging people who perhaps don’t have the confidence to come along to the centre by providing taster sessions in places like sheltered housing.”

Also receiving much-needed good cause cash this month is the Barnet Voluntary Service Council’s (VSC) Reach Out Further project. A £151,273 grant will help the VSC to encourage new volunteers from hard to reach communities like the long-term unemployed, older people, refugees and BME groups.

Sarah Rogers, Volunteer Centre Manager, said: “We’re really excited about the grant because it will enable us to carry out the outreach work which will not only directly help the community, it will also make a huge difference to the volunteers themselves.

“People from isolated and hard to reach communities can gain a lot from volunteering including increased confidence and self esteem, work experience and even language practice. In the long-term we’re really hoping to make a difference to people’s lives, helping them integrate into the community and even helping them back into employment.”

Two other successful projects in the capital are the Metropolitan Support Trust, Home Learning Project Finsbury Park with a grant of £171,283 and the Homeless Families Project, Support For Homeless Families and Children, who secured £264,782 to continue to support disadvantaged and vulnerable homeless families and children

Debbie Pippard, Big Lottery Fund Head of Region for London, said: “Reaching Communities is about supporting some of the most vulnerable people in our communities and helping them to live happy and successful lives. BIG is delighted to be able to help these worthy London projects either continue their good work or embark on something new. We hope that with the help of the cash awards received today, many lives across the capital will be improved and communities strengthened.”

Further information

Big Lottery Fund Press Office: 020 7211 1888
Out of hours contact: 07867 500 572
Public Enquiries Line: 08454 102 030
Textphone: 0845 6021 659
Full details of the Big Lottery Fund programmes and grant awards are available on the website: www.biglotteryfund.org.uk

Notes to Editors

• Under Reaching Communities, the Big Lottery Fund awards grants between £10,000 and £500,000 to projects that offer people better life chances, build stronger communities, develop improved rural and urban environments and improve health and well being.
• The Big Lottery Fund rolls out close to £2 million in Lottery good cause money every 24 hours, which together with other Lottery distributors means that across the UK most people are within a few miles of a Lottery-funded project.
• The Big Lottery Fund, the largest of the National Lottery good cause distributors, has been rolling out grants to health, education, environment and charitable causes across the UK since its inception in June 2004. It was established by Parliament on 1 December 2006.
• Since the National Lottery began in 1994, 28p from every pound spent by the public has gone to Good Causes. As a result, over £20 billion has now been raised and more than 280,000 grants given out across the arts, sport, heritage, charities, health, education and the environment.