Church project team awarded £5,000 grant

St Andrew's, Dearnley and Smithy Bridge

The project team of the Wider Welcome scheme at St Andrew's, the parish church of Dearnley and Smithy Bridge, is to receive a grant of £5,000 from the Garfield Weston Foundation.

Stuart Carmichael, who has responsibility for submitting grant applications on behalf of the team, said the work in this instance involved the provision at the back of Church of a new toilet with facilities for the disabled plus the creation of new, disabled-friendly doors from the porch into the parish room.

He said he was currently in the process of acquiring estimates for electrically-operated aluminium-framed glass doors on the one hand and electrically-operated wooden doors with glass panels on the other.

The grant is conditional upon the project being fully funded and accomplished by the autumn of 2013.

Peter Shrigley, Chairman of the project team, said: "This is indeed good news, coming as it does so early in a new year of fund-raising. It is most welcome and extremely encouraging."

The Garfield Weston Foundation was established in 1958 by Willard Garfield Weston, a Canadian business man who had arrived in the UK with his family in 1932. Trustees are all lineal descendants of the founder and they remain committed to continuing the ethos that has made the Foundation one of the largest and most respected charitable institutions in the country.