The London Evening Standard has raised more than £1m for its Dispossessed appeal just 18 days since launching the campaign.
The capital’s daily free newspaper hit its target on Friday, earning £1.18m since the campaign to help London’s poorest people started on 20 July.
Taking into account gift aid donations, the total raised will be in excess of £2m.
‘London is not only the greatest capital city in the world, it has now proved it is also the most generous,’said Geordie Greig, editor of the Standard.
‘This is a record amount of money raised in record time by a newspaper campaigning for charity. Only appeals for war-wounded and natural disaster victims have had a greater result.
‘Poverty is a blight on too many lives in our city and it is wonderful that Londoners from every background and degree of wealth have given and continue to give to the Evening Standard’s Dispossessed Fund.”
The project aims to distribute money to grassroots projects across the capital. Charities can bid for grants of between £500 and £5,000 through the Standard’s website.
The Community Foundation Network is working with a Standard advisory board to distribute cash in five key areas: education; getting people into work; tackling gangs, guns and knife crime and improving health.
Other issues such as homelessness, pensioner hardship and the working poor will also be considered for grants.
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