ChildLine's yellow plaque
The charity consortium hopes the scheme will encourage people to leave gifts to charities in their wills
Remember A Charity has launched a new yellow memorial plaque scheme that is designed to recognise the contribution made to charities by people who leave gifts in their wills.
Remember A Charity, a consortium of 140 charities that work together to encourage legacy giving, said the scheme was inspired by the blue plaques awarded by English Heritage that commemorate links between historic figures and the buildings where they lived and worked.
Remember A Charity hopes that the idea will encourage more people to leave a gift to charity in their wills.
It has announced the first 15 plaques that have been awarded to charitable projects and initiatives that were possible because of legacy gifts.
ChildLine, Cancer Research UK, Guide Dogs and Liverpool Cathedral were among the first charities to receive a plaque.
CRUK received a plaque for its new research centre, Brough Equipment Park, which is named after one of its legacy benefactors Muriel Brough, who left the charity £10m.
Rob Cope, director of Remember A Charity, said: "The idea of legacy has been very much in the news this year.
"Our new yellow plaques recognise the legacies of all the supporters who have left gifts to charities in their wills, after taking care of loved ones, and helped the good work live on.
"Few of us currently include a charity in our will. We wanted to do something to make people pause for thought and think about including a gift to charity in their own will."
Legacy giving is worth around £2bn a year in the UK, which is the equivalent of 19 Comic Relief appeals, Remember A Charity said. It accounts for 30 per cent of the income of the UK’s top 10 charities, but only 7 per cent of people currently include a charity in their will.
