Proudfoot Customers Help Support Scarborough Disabled Swimming Group

Scarborough Disabled Swimming Group has benefited from a donation of £2,500 this month, raised through the 5p carrier bag charge in Proudfoot stores.

Scarborough Disabled Swimming Group (SDSG) is a charity primarily offering accessible swimming opportunities, including hydro-rehab and fitness classes, an aqua sensory programme and more, for people with a disability (and those over 50 years of age) and their family who live in Scarborough, Whitby, Filey or the surrounding district.

The donation will help towards the cost of the swimming group’s Special Olympics team attending regional competitions and the pool and lifeguard costs required for training, enabling the group to take up to two extra swimmers. The funds will also contribute towards items for the final stages of the group’s Aqua Sensory Project that will see sensory equipment installed at Scarborough Sports Village, where the swimming group is held.

Richard Westgarth, Chairman & Volunteer Coordinator at Scarborough Disabled Swimming Group, said the group had also seen four new members join after seeing it advertised on Proudfoot leaflets and in-store as a recipient of the carrier bag sales fund.

He added: “After a lot of work over the last two years, we have secured capital funding to install aqua sensory equipment at the pool. It will be the largest in North Yorkshire, open to the public, spanning the whole learner pool and three lanes in the main pool, costing in excess of £70k. 

“We are hoping this equipment will help increase our session numbers, in the long term, enabling us to become less dependent on external funding to pay our pool hire and lifeguard fees.”

The Proudfoot Group will support four local causes over the next year with proceeds raised through the 5p carrier bag charge in its stores. The group’s four stores have been raising money on a voluntary basis for good causes in this way since the introduction of the 5p carrier bag charge in 2015 and have donated almost £45,000 from the funds raised to charities and other groups in the area. In addition to the thousands raised through the carrier bag charge to date, Proudfoot stores have supported local causes with more than £57,000 in donations raised through Nisa’s Making a Difference Locally charity.