London ,
05
October
2015
|
12:59
Europe/London

London Wildlife Trust wins Lord Mayor's Dragon Award

Conservation charity, London Wildlife Trust (LWT) has won a prestigious Lord Mayor’s Dragon Award for its partnership with the Mace Foundation, which helped boost community engagement in the capital’s green spaces.

Winners of the Lord Mayor’s Dragon Awards were announced at a Mansion House ceremony. The Awards, now in its 28th year is among the most established and distinguished Corporate Responsibility Awards in the UK.

London Wildlife Trust is dedicated to protecting London’s wildlife and wild spaces, improving lives for people in London by creating sustainable green spaces that improve wellbeing. Researchers from Universities of Glasgow and Edinburgh have found that access to green spaces reduces the socioeconomic inequalities and mental well-being gap among urban dwellers.

Its winning partnership involved the establishment of a Volunteer Week, in which 500 Mace employees devoted time to practical upkeep of green spaces. The partnership continued and Mace employees regularly take part in skilled volunteering, as well as utilise LWT’s reserves for training events. Over the duration of the partnership, 1,500 Mace employees have volunteered, working alongside LWT staff in improving community access to green spaces in 11 London boroughs.

The partnership means that LWF benefits from technical knowledge and access to Mace’s contractors who improved facilities at the Rosendale Allotments, by building steps to allow safe access on site and de-silted a pond which is being used as a learning facility by a local Scout Centre.

The Lord Mayor Alan Yarrow, who presented the awards, added: “I could not be more proud to champion the participants and winners of the 2015 Lord Mayor’s Dragon Awards. Their innovative contribution to our communities shows the immense value of CSR. In fact, we could not do without it. Today’s Dragon Award winners such as London Wildlife Trust are continuing this work with a broad range of initiatives – enabling business employees to use their skills to maximise the impact of the voluntary sector, and help 300,000 Londoners directly. Whether serving as mentors for school children, or accountants for charities – they are a fantastic example of corporate community engagement, and helping to build a fairer and more prosperous society.”

This year, the applicants for the Lord Mayor’s Dragon Awards volunteered around 92,000 hours, helped around 300,000 people in London and created 5,000 training placements as a result of their community engagement.

The other winners

  • Alium Partners– Winner of the Heart of the City Award for Best New Community Programme
  • Barclays- Winner of the Lord Mayor’s Award for Longstanding Achievement
  • Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP- Winner of the Enterprise and Employment Award
  •  IBM- Winner of the Education and Lifelong-learning Award
  • Aimia- Winner of the Future Proofing Charities Award

For more infomation visit www.dragonawards.org.uk