BCTG and PTP pledge £10,000 to help Black Country folk get through the winter
Leading Midlands training group BCTG and its sister company PTP have pledged a total of £10,000 to help local charities and initiatives in the Black Country as Christmas approaches.
Already £5,000 has been delivered of the £10,000 total, which is split evenly between BCTG and PTP.
BCTG chairman Chris Luty said: “At BCTG Group, we genuinely want to be an organisation that not only supports its learners and staff, but one that actively makes a difference in our local community.
“We already do a lot of ‘stuff’, including sponsoring Dudley Town FC, several local youth teams as well a variety of charity runs and cake eating sessions!
“Our charity motto at BCTG is ‘Do Good Stuff’ and so far we have committed £10,000 over this winter. It’s not just about Christmas, it’s about what we can do during the whole winter.”
In previous years, BCTG conducted “Random Acts of Kindness”, where they stopped people in the street and did “good things” such as paying for their parking or their shopping.
But going forward, Chris wants his staff to do things differently.
“It’s not just about donating money, I want us to get involved locally with those who need our support. It’s far more rewarding this way!
“And maybe we can come to understand some of the issues people face,” he said.
Staff have already come up with suggestions like Winter Packs for the Homeless and Book & Toy Drive, but Chris is calling on them to come up with more suggestions.
“We need ideas that are practicable and deliverable. Things that we can actually make happen, now and into the New Year. It always take longer than you expect to get things like this moving, so we are looking to start planning now.”
Ideas and initiatives staff have already committed to support include:
£500 to a Book & Toy Drive for the Waheguru Foundation annual collection. This supports The Children’s Society and Action for Children and first began in 2017.
£500 to the Brierley Hill-based Santa’s Black Country Toy Appeal.
£500 to the Alice Charity in Newcastle-under-Lyme, which specialises in helping families who are in need. They also run a food pantry and are seeking food donations and selection boxes for children who don’t get anything at Christmas.
£500 towards the Homelessness Support Target, providing 100 helping hand hampers.
£500 through the local boxing club to provide Christmas boxes for local people.
£500 to provide gift hampers for residents at St Basils, the homeless charity.
£500 to Smethwick Food Bank.
£500 to Tipton Food Bank.
£500 to LJM Domiciliary Care to provide gifts for the elderly who are alone this Christmas.
Already delivered is £250 each to Birmingham Dogs Home and Bleakholt Animal Sanctuary.
Chris Luty said: “As someone else said, every little helps and we hope that what is really a drop in the ocean in terms of people’s needs in these difficult times, can go someway to helping local people and the organisations who seek to support them.”
BCTG Group is a West Midlands-based training organisation which supports almost 10,000 young people and adults each year
The group has ten sites in Birmingham, the Black Country, Staffordshire and Derbyshire, and includes PTP Training, trading as Performance Through People, BCTG Ltd, Eurosource Solutions, BCTG Skills Centres, Further Training and The Apprenticeship Works.
The group offers 166 different types of apprenticeship, 84 different adult upskilling and reskilling courses and 27 pre-apprenticeship programmes for 16 to 18-year-olds. These include everything from healthcare and early years care to construction, engineering, manufacturing and logistics, through to business skills in IT, management and team leading.
