Two animal rescue charities are celebrating today after each being awarded a £5,000 donation. Protected Paws Animal Rescue which operates across the capital and the Dogstar Foundation based in the city centre will receive a monetary gift as part of Benefact Group’s Movement for Good Awards.

Established last year, Protected Paws Animal Rescue works to rescue and re-home animals all over London. While the Dogstar Foundation was set up by two former London Underground project workers, to rescue and care for street dogs in Sri Lanka.

More than 104,000 people around the country gave their time and nominated the animal welfare causes they cared most about to receive one of the ten special grants that were available. The winning charities were chosen at random from those nominated.

Now in its fifth year, the Movement for Good Awards is the flagship charitable giving initiative from Gloucestershire-based Benefact Group. This year once again, more than £1million will be gifted to charities up and down the UK and Ireland, following £4million being given to good causes since the initiative started in 2019.

Since the awards began, more than 1.6million nominations have been received resulting in over 2,200 charities benefitting from valuable donations.

This year, 420 charities will be awarded £1,000 donations, while 40 good causes will be awarded £5,000 sums via special grants throughout the year, aimed at helping charities in specific sectors. Winners will be drawn at random and the more times a charity is nominated the more chance it has of being selected. Further gifts totalling £500,000 will also be donated in larger amounts later this year.

To find out how to support the Movement for Good Awards and to nominate a cause you care about visit www.movementforgood.com.

Mark Hews, Group Chief Executive of Benefact Group, says: “We would like to thank every single person who took the time to nominate an animal charity as part of our Movement for Good Awards. Benefact Group is the third largest corporate donor in the UK and has an ambition to be the biggest. Owned by a charity, all of its available profits go to good causes, and the more the Group grows, the more the Group can give. We know that £5,000 can make a huge difference to the incredible work that animal charities do and we’re looking forward to seeing how this financial boost will help animal welfare.”

Benefact Group has donated almost £200million to charitable causes since 2014 and has just been recognised as the third biggest corporate giver in the UK2. The organisation aims to reach £250million in donations by 2025.