After raising over £4000 for Guide Dogs Cymru through running the London Marathon in April, Alun Cairns MP has visited the charity to discuss how the money will support the work that they do.
The Vale MP handed Guide Dogs a cheque for £4,153.01 and also had the opportunity to donate a name to a guide dog puppy. The Vale MP held a public vote through his social media pages to determine the potential names, depending on whether the puppy is male or female. The vote resulted in a strong Gavin & Stacey theme with the public deciding that the names would be ‘Smithy’ or ‘Nessa’!
The purpose of Guide Dogs is to provide life-changing services for independence of people living with sight loss and their friends and family. Currently, they support around 200,000 people in the UK and they aim to increase that to 500,000 by 2023.
Mr Cairns said, “It was fantastic to meet with Guide Dogs Cymru to hand over the funds raised through my Marathon run earlier in the year. I’ve met with them in the Vale in recent years to support the ongoing work that they do and I am delighted that this money will go a long way in making a difference to them. They make a real difference to improving quality of life for so many people and they deserve praise and recognition for this.”
Andrea Gordon, Engagement Manager for Guide Dogs Cymru, said: “We were delighted to welcome Alun to our centre so that he could see for himself how we train our wonderful dogs to bring mobility and independence to people living with sight loss . Alun has supported Guide Dogs’ calls for audio-visual announcements on buses, helped to highlight the dangers of pavement parking and backed our campaign for taxi drivers to receive mandatory disability equality training. By raising this money, he will help to fund a guide dog of the future.”
