19 September 1997

National Lottery Charities Board invests £126 million in Learning and Education Projects

Children and young people are among the main beneficiaries of today’s National Lottery Charities Board announcement of 1,326 grants worth over £126 million to charities and community groups offering learning and volunteering opportunities across England.

The grants are awarded under the Board’s New opportunities and choices and Voluntary sector development programme, launched in November 1996. They support some of the priorities which the current Government indicated would be included in its goals for future lottery funding set out in the White Paper published in July 1997 called The People’s Lottery.

Two hundred and fifteen grants, 16 per cent of the total, have been awarded to groups offering extra learning opportunities to children. This represents £7,205,553 (six per cent of the money). Young people will also benefit from training and volunteering opportunities. Over £19 million has been awarded to 203 projects (15 per cent of the grants and money) working in this area.

Kid’s Clubs Network will use their grant of £454,948 support the network of after school clubs across the country. The Pooh Bear Reading Assistance Society are receiving a grant of £173,483 to provide one to one reading support to parents and children in Hull. Other grant recipients include branches of the British Red Cross, Age Concern, Deafblind UK and Arthritis Care.

Nearly half the grants (44 per cent) worth £41 million are for projects which will extend volunteering opportunities. Through volunteering people gain new and practical skills which could help them in finding employment. Over a quarter of the projects funded will support people of all ages to gain basic literacy and numeracy skills. In total, 356 grants worth £32 million have been awarded in this area and many will provide three years of support to charities and community groups working in this field.

Announcing the grants today, Janet Paraskeva, Director for England, said:

"I am delighted that so many of our grants are tackling real educational need. We also continue to address a number of national priorities identified by Government. In addition to the £126 million awarded today for learning projects, we awarded £159 million to health projects in December 1996. In the last month we have received requests for over 31,000 application packs for our Improving people’s living environment programme which addresses homelessness and environment issues."