Addingham Civic Society visited the Houses of Parliament last week to receive an award recognising their outstanding contribution to the civic movement and fundraising for a village games area.

The Addingham society raised more than £125,000 for the multi-use games area (Muga) in the village, which opened this year.

The prestigious Marsh Christian Trust made the awards to two civic society groups and one individual at a meeting of the 70-strong All Party Parliamentary Group for Civic Societies last Tuesday (December 2).

The area’s own MP, housing minister Kris Hopkins, presented the award to Keith Appleyard and Mike Bolton, of Addingham Civic Society. The two managed the Muga project.

Mr Hopkins said: “It was a proud moment for me, as the local MP, to welcome Mike and Keith to Westminster to receive this exceedingly well-deserved award on behalf of Addingham Civic Society.

“The multi-use games area is now a hugely cherished community resource, and stands as a shining testament to the efforts of the wonderful volunteers behind it.

“Addingham Civic Society is a model of its kind and local residents are right to take great pride in its achievements.”

The Addingham Muga is in regular use, with a well-supported football coaching programme for boys and girls on a Sunday morning that is in such demand that some evening sessions may need to be set up.

Ilkley Tennis Club is running a tennis coaching programme for Addingham youngsters and ‘Rusty Racquets’ on a Saturday is also at capacity.

Future plans include setting up a netball team, with support from Netball England, and for Addingham Cricket Club to use the Muga for winter training. It  is fully floodlit for evening use.

Chairman of the Marsh Christian Trust, Brian Marsh, said “A huge congratulations to all the Civic Voice winners. We set up the Marsh Civic Awards to recognise and support these sorts of grass roots volunteer initiatives and it’s a credit to the work done by Civic Voice volunteers that this year we needed to expand the number of Awards we gave out.”

To book the Muga, contact info@addinghamcivicsociety.co.uk