Lottery cash regenerating North East communities

Area:

North East England

Programme:

Reaching Communities

Release date:

30 1 2007

In Easington the colliery may be closed, but miners are not forgotten as long as the Easington Social Welfare Centre remains open. The village hub is a reminder of the miners who built it for the community in 1934, but it has needed repairs for many years. The centre has previously struggled with planning refurbishment and sustaining village activities, because of a lack of long-term funding.

An award of £210,596 will help the centre hire a manger to plan the restoration of the charity’s historic building, organise volunteers and develop community services. Current activities will also be extended, including an angling club, football team meetings, dance classes, job seeker sessions and social events.

Cyril Dunn, Secretary of the Easington Social Welfare Centre, said: “It’s a wonderful old building but it needs so much work. We need to keep it in memory of the miners who built the place. It’s the only piece of history we’ve got left – it’s our last symbol of heritage.

“We have struggled for so long to get the building put right and made decent for everyone to use. This grant will be a real lift to the whole community.”

Meanwhile, the regeneration of social housing in the deprived area of north Sunderland will involve more than laying bricks and mortar thanks to a £330,320 grant to the Southwick Neighbourhood Youth Project.

The project will form links between the regeneration scheme and young people in central Southwick to give them a voice and a stake in the development, and help new residents to integrate into the community. A youth link worker will bridge the gap between young people and the regeneration project through outreach work, representation on forums and the media.

Meg Robertson, Project Co-ordinator, said: “Our project will make sure young people who are already residents are aware of how the development is progressing so that they can have a voice and not just feel like they have been excluded.

“There will also be new young people coming into the area and we need to think about how we look to include these young people and encourage them to be active citizens and part of the community.”

James Turner, Big Lottery Fund Head of North East England, said: “Both today’s grants are a real boost to these local charities as they can now move ahead with five-year projects bringing people together, which is a key aim of the Reaching Communities programme.”

The Reaching Communities programme delivers grants of up to £500,000 over five years to schemes that offer people better chances in life, build strong communities, improve urban and rural environments and promote healthy activities.

Further information

Big Lottery Fund Press Office: 020 7211 1888
Out of hours contact: 07867 500 572
Public Enquiries Line: 08454 102030
Textphone: 845 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

• 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.
• On 1 December 2006 the Big Lottery Fund was officially established by Parliament and at the same time assumed the residual responsibilities of the dissolved National Lottery Charities Board (Community Fund) the New Opportunities Fund, and the Millennium Commission. The Fund is building on the experience and best practice of the merged bodies to simplify funding in those areas where they overlap and to ensure Lottery funding provides the best possible value for money
• Reaching Communities is part of the Big Lottery Fund’s portfolio of new programmes. Following an intense and comprehensive process of consultation with stakeholders and the general public over the last year, the Fund has undertaken to distribute 60-70% of its funding to the third sector.  At least one-third of BIG funding will be demand-led and lightly prescribed.  In England, this will amount to at least £600 million over the period 2005-2009. This commitment will be met from a variety of funding streams, including, Reaching Communities, Awards for All, part of the Young People’s Fund, Community Buildings, Advice Services and the People’s Millions.
• UK-wide, the Big Lottery Fund will distribute through its new programmes and allocations funding worth over £2.6bn between now and April 2009. Regularly updated information on the Big Lottery Fund’s new programmes is available at www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/publications.htm

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