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One of Scotland’s oldest traditions, the Riding of the Marches, will take place in Edinburgh in a couple of weeks (Sunday 12 September) thanks to a Lottery award announced this week.

The event is thought to date back to the 12^th Century when riders on horseback carried out an annual inspection of their town’s Marches or boundary stones.

This year, in Edinburgh, a cavalcade of 250 horses will follow a planned route through the city ending with a procession up the Royal Mile. Edinburgh March Riding Association Limited will use their grant of £4,352 from the Awards for All programme for organisational management on the day.

Awards for All is the National Lottery’s small grants scheme which gives out small grants to make a big difference to Scotland’s communities. Today the programme is awarding grants totalling £694,545 to 99 organisations across the country. Find the list of Awards for All grants 
- 494KB announced in Scotland today (.xls).

Thanks to an award of £3,550, The Lazer Group from East Ayrshire can now take 12 young people from Dalmellington to visit a mission in Romania during the October school holiday. The youth group will work in local schools and children's centres, painting, building and helping with the social needs of the local community as well as delivering food parcels. Upon their return, they will use their new skills within East Aryshire and to seek employment or further training.  

Environmental Arts Theatre Company (EATC), based in West Lothian, will use their grant of £9,700 to deliver a series of workshops and creative music sessions to promote the benefits of eating fruit and vegetables to young children aged between five and 12 years-old throughout the region.  

The group meet the children through sessions at primary schools but the majority of the workshops will take place out of school hours. EATC has identified a number of areas where they will work, specifically those which are deprived and show low fruit and vegetable intake. The grant will pay for set design, materials and costumes, sound equipment, publicity materials, facilitator fees and travel costs.

Also funded today is Coisir Og Ghaidhlig. An award of £3,000 will allow the young people’s choir to travel to Thurso to compete in the National Mod in early October. The grant will fund travel costs for 20 people to fly from Islay to Wick.

An Awards for All spokesman, said: “Today’s awards make it easy to see what a difference the Awards for All programme makes to communities across the length and breadth of the country. The great thing about this programme is that relatively small amounts of money can make a huge difference for projects trying to put something back into their local communities. We wish all the groups funded today every success as they turn their dreams into reality.”

Awards for All is supported by three of the National Lottery distributors in Scotland: Scottish Arts Council, Big Lottery Fund and sportscotland. The scheme makes awards of between £500 and £10,000 to grass-roots community groups and voluntary organisations.

Find funded groups in your area at:  http://www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/newsroom-sco

For further information

Lorna McNiven on 0141 242 1451
Public Enquiries Line: 08454 102030
Textphone: 0845 6021 659

Full details of the Awards for All grant awards are available at: www.awardsforall.org.uk

Notes to Editors

• Awards for All is a joint awards programme set up to help small groups whose income is less than £20,000 per annum.  It involves three Lottery distributors: the Big Lottery Fund, the Scottish Arts Council and sportscotland.
• Awards for All makes grants to help people take part in arts, sport, social, environmental, health related, educational and other community activities.
• The Heritage Lottery Fund left Awards for All on 31st March 2009. Details of its small grant schemes are available at www.hlf.org.uk.