Angus MacDonald OBE - Beacon Prize for New Initiatives

Angus and Michie MacDonald have been awarded The Beacon Prize for New Initiatives for their inspirational work leading the Moidart Trust, tackling the ongoing decline of communities in the West of Scotland by focusing on support for local enterprises. Angus is also the founder of the Caledonian Challenge, which has raised over £10 million for the Scottish Community Foundation.

Angus and Michie received their award at a gala Prize Ceremony on Thursday 4th November at the prestigious Goldsmiths' Hall in the City of London, surrounded by key members of the charitable, political and media worlds, with keynote speeches from Nick Hurd MP, Minister for Civil Society, and Dame Stephanie Shirley, the British Government's Founding Ambassador for Philanthropy.

The MacDonalds are among nine recipients of the 2010 Beacon Prize and join the ranks of previous Beacon winners such as Sir Bob Geldof, Jamie Oliver and environmentalist Zac Goldsmith, who have all been recognised for their charitable work with this high honour, described by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown as the 'Nobel Prize of the charity world'.

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About the Beacon Prize:

The Beacon Fellowship is a charitable organisation set up to encourage individual contributions to charitable and social causes and to celebrate and showcase best practice in giving. Beacon awards annual prizes to individuals who have made exceptional contributions to charitable causes or to organisations that benefit the public.

An overall winner will be selected every year, who will be given a cash award of £30,000, to be invested in an innovative way by the winner in a charity of their choice. Beacon believes that by highlighting the achievements of the prize winners and showcasing innovation and best practice in philanthropy, others will be inspired and encouraged to make their own contribution.

The wide range of nomination categories means that the Beacon Prize programme is truly unique -- it brings together a remarkable blend of individuals of different socio-economic and professional backgrounds. The fact that a grass-roots activist is as well represented as an individual who donates millions of pounds each year is in itself a great achievement, and one of the many components of a process that makes the Beacon Prize such a powerful tool for changing the culture of giving in the U.K.

Since 1st April 2009, The Beacon Fellowship Charitable Trust has been incorporated with the Community Foundation Network, a registered charity committed to developing philanthropy particularly at a local community level, representing 57 Community Foundations who last year supported 1400 significant clients who invested £70m into 20,000 philanthropic projects.

If you'd like to learn more about the Beacon Prize 2010, please visit www.beaconfellowship.org.uk


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Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• West
• Scotland
• Moidart
• Scottish
• Community
• Foundation
• Third
• Sector
• Not
• For
• Profit
• Charity
• Enterprise
• Beacon
• Prize
• Philanthropy

[davidpidsley]

Angus raised £10m for Scottish Community Foundation by founding Caledonian Challenge. This video is an excellent overview of his work in his own words. David Pidsley