Bath Rugby : Bath named Community club of the Year

Premier Rugby Chief Executive Mark McCafferty with Jimmy Deane and Vicky Heslop of the Community Foundation

Bath named Community club of the Year

16 May 2008, 2:17 pm

By Simon Clark

The Bath Rugby Community Foundation have been voted (alongside Saracens) as the EDF Energy Parliamentary Community club of the year.

The award is due recognition for the fantastic work that the Community Foundation have been putting in to the local community ever since its inception in 2001 with only a part-time community officer. Since then it has gone from strength to strength.

Additionally the club picked up an award for best impact for the Wilts / Sportsmatch Girls Rugby Programme and a third award for the Language through Sport programme in the category of new community initiatives.

The foundation runs an extensive programme of activities which among other things brings tag rugby into schools across the local area, provides player appearances for school visits and other events, addresses social and health issues, help improve foreign language skills in schools and runs (in conjunction with local councils) an after school study support centre in the form of the ‘Playing for Success’ centre situated at the Recreation Ground.

Bath Rugby alongside the other nominated clubs made presentations at the Houses of Parliament in Westminster about their community work to a judging panel which included Derek Wyatt MP, chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Rugby Union Group, Mark McCafferty, Chief Executive of Premier Rugby, and Louise Poole, Director of Sponsorship at EDF Energy.

The awards recognise the positive impact that professional rugby clubs have on their local environment, community and society.

Combined, Premiership Clubs are now generating over £1m of community funding and have 100 plus community staff delivering a range of programmes aimed at addressing sport, fitness, social and education issues.

Bath Rugby Community Foundation Manager Jimmy Deane said: “Everyone at the club is overjoyed with this prestigious award and it recognises the outstanding work delivered by the team of incredibly dedicated people we have here. To be recognised nationally shows the enormous impact the club is having on local people.”