Record payout from London Marathon charity
More than £5.3 million from
the record surplus made by the London Marathon last year was awarded in
grants to help build, preserve, refurbish and purchase sports and
recreation facilities, the organisers’ charitable trust announced today.
The London Marathon Charitable
Trust donated grants of between £1,852 and £235,000 to 59 projects in
25 local authority areas in and around the capital, as well as setting
aside a further £1 million towards its commitment to support community
legacy facilities after the London 2012 Olympics.
The largest single award was a
contribution towards the construction of new changing and community
sports facilities in Victoria Park, Tower Hamlets, while the smallest,
£1,852, paid for a twin-hulled canoe, known as a katakanu, at Hillingdon
Outdoor Activities Centre.
Other large grants included
£215,000 to upgrade the athletics track and run-ups at the Lee Valley
Athletics Centre in Enfield; £190,000 to redevelop Haggerston Baths in
Hackney; and £150,000 to Samuel Montague Youth Centre to replace an old
floodlit playing area with a new full-size multi-sports pitch.
In addition, the Dudley
Winterbottom Memorial Hall in Hackleton, Northamptonshire, near the site
of the adidas Silverstone Half Marathon, received £80,000 to build a
new two-storey annexe.
Numerous smaller grants were
also made, such as £7,000 for outdoor gym equipment at Kenton Recreation
Ground in Harrow; £7,500 for new gym equipment at St John’s Church Hall
at the Hanlon Centre in Enfield; £20,000 for improvements to Brittons
Skate Plaza at Havering; £25,000 to upgrade Brockwell Park BMX track in
Lambeth; and £25,000 to refurbish basketball and football pitches at
Eleanor Smith Special School in Newham.
Each year the surplus from the
London Marathon Limited, which organises the London Marathon and other
events, is transferred under Gift Aid to the Trust and the trustees
award grants to further one of the objectives laid down by its founders,
Chris Brasher and John Disley, namely: “to raise money for the
provision of recreational facilities in London”.
The amount awarded in 2010
brings the total grants made by the Trust to date to more than £40
million aiding more than 900 projects.
The Trust’s chairman John
Bryant said: “We are delighted once again to have been able to award so
many grants to so many important local sports and recreation projects.
“One of the primary objectives
of the race when it was founded 30 years ago was to help provide
facilities for recreation and leisure, and it is heartening to know that
the event’s success means we have been able to increase the overall
value of our grants each year.”
Bryant, formerly the Trust’s
vice chairman, took over as chairman this year when the previous chair,
John Disley, was named president of the London Marathon.
by Larry Eder
