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CSV
Action Earth environmental volunteering campaign:- March 1 2008 to
July 31 2008
SUPERMARKET
giant Morrisons is giving away cash grants to help the local
environment as part of the CSV Action Earth volunteering campaign.
Morrisons have agreed to provide £50 grants to 900 voluntary groups
across the country to help kick start community environmental
projects.
This is the 2nd year that Morrisons has supported the national
environmental volunteering campaign run by CSV, the UK's largest
volunteering charity. Last year over 15,500 people took part in 900
CSV Action Earth projects in the UK giving over 300,000 volunteering
hours while planting more than 4,000 trees, collecting nearly 7,000
sacks of litter, cleaning nearly 7,000 metres of river bed and
overall improving nearly 2,000 acres of land.
Gillian Hall, Customer Services Director at Morrisons says:-
"We are pleased that the sponsorship we have given CSV is going to
help kick-start many excellent community environmental projects.
More than one in ten volunteers choose to give time to help the
environment. We think CSV Action Earth offers an opportunity to
support big ideas by local people keen to make changes for the
better where they live."
Mike Williams, Director of CSV Environment says:- "Helping the
environment can seem like a monumental task, but volunteering in
your local community, whether collecting dumped plastic for
recycling, planting trees or clearing up a grotty area is something
we can all do. We believe that local people themselves are best
placed to decide what needs doing in their area and thanks to
Morrisons' grants they can now do something about it."
Volunteering is not only good for the environment but is good for
your health as well. Independent research commissioned by Action
Earth's sister campaign, CSV Make a Difference Day shows that 42% of
volunteers in environmental and conservation projects believe it
helps them lose weight while 61% say volunteering helps combat
stress. To register a project and apply for a grant or get
more information on CSV Action Earth, call CSV on Tel: 0121 328 7455
or visit
www.csv.org.uk/actionearth.
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Housing Federation Responds to New Funding Announcement in North
West
HOUSING
associations in the North West will play a major role in delivering
more affordable housing across the region. The Housing
Corporation has first details of how its National Affordable Housing
Programme (NAHP) 2008 to 2011 will be delivered. The announcement sets
out how £3.3bn of the £8.4bn programme will be spent, and lists the
first housing providers to be awarded funding.
The Regional investment for the whole programme in the North West
will be £526 million.
The National Housing Federation recently warned house prices in the
North West are set to rise to £200,000 by 2012 and with around half
a million people in the region now on social housing waiting lists,
this investment is urgently required.
The list of the first
housing providers to be awarded funding shows that it accounts for
£1.8bn of the programme, and that of the 105 organisations to
receive funding, 92 are housing associations, which appear to have
been awarded 98% of the grant covered by the breakdown. This
demonstrates the sector's commitment to delivering affordable homes,
and to meeting the higher standards of quality, design and
environmental efficiency set out in the latest bidding criteria.
And this is only the first wave of funding from the corporation's
3 year programme, which will see a total of £8.4 billion invested in
new affordable homes across England. Additional investment
announcements will follow over the coming months.
Sallie Bridgen, National Housing Federation Regional Manager said:-
"The National Housing Federation are pleased that Government
has heeded it's warning about a housing timebomb and are working to
diffuse the situation.
Housing associations working with key
partners in the region are geared up for delivery.
The region
has many diverse housing issues to deal with, from the ongoing
problem of low demand to areas with high demand and high cost
unaffordable housing including rural areas. Detailed
information for the region has not yet been released and we will
await this with interest." |
