These partnerships form part of ‘Orange Community’, Orange’s new community investment programme which supports two charities per region across the country. To determine which charities to support on a local-level, Orange invited employees to vote and received over 5,000 responses in total.
As part of this scheme, all Orange employees will be encouraged to get involved through fundraising projects and volunteering schemes. In addition, all employees interested in volunteering will for the first time be given an annual, paid, flexible day-off so they have the opportunity to support their chosen charity. Volunteers will be able to help by gardening, decorating or teaching, or simply offer companionship to people in need.
Sue Hammett, community investment manager at Orange UK, said: “We are delighted that so many of our employees have got behind Orange Community, our charity scheme which supports our key corporate responsibility themes of Include, Protect and Environment. Our employees already have an impressive track record of supporting Orange’s charity partners, having raised £470,000 over the last two and a half years. We are looking forward to continuing this success with our new charity partners over the coming months.”
Martin Field, UK director of fundraising at Barnardo’s, said: “We are extremely pleased to be one of the chosen charities for the partnership and it is a real accolade to have been selected by Orange employees. We know that their staff will go the extra mile to fundraise and volunteer for us and that their efforts will help Barnardo’s support some of the UK’s most disadvantaged and vulnerable children.”
Orange’s eight charity partnerships are initially scheduled to last twelve months, beginning in April 2009.