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A riding club that helps reduce youth crime on tough London estates by offering free lessons has won a £60,000 sports charity award.
The Ebony Horse Club in Brixton - billed as the opposite of the country set Pony Club - picked up the London Legacy Award for helping to transform hundreds of young people's lives.
The award, backed by the Standard and funded by City Hall and the Beyond Sport charity, recognises a sports project which brings social change.
Mayor Boris Johnson presented the prize last night to Ebony founder Rose Spearing. He said: "The Ebony Horse Club is a prime example of how sport can truly enrich and empower young people as we gear towards the 2012 Olympics. It has operated in a disadvantaged area in Brixton and helped turn around the lives of the community through horse riding."
Nick Keller from Beyond Sport said: "The Ebony Horse Club provides a creative solution to youth truancy and anti-social behaviour."
Club members get at least 12 lessons a year at riding centres in Kingston and Lewisham and the best are rewarded with a trip to the Brecon Beacons for a week in spring. Riders also visit London art galleries and the All England showjumping grounds at Hickstead, West Sussex.
About 80 per cent of Ebony's riders are from ethnic minorities and many have had a difficult start in life. Crime and family breakdown are rife in the three estates - Loughborough, Moorlands and Angell Town - from which Ebony recruits. Two years ago one of the first members, Nathan Foster, was shot dead in a Brixton street.
Ebony plans to open a £1.2million riding school by the 2012 Games near Loughborough Junction in a park that was once a haven for drug users. The club is also working on exchanges with riding schools from Newcastle, Philadelphia and Soweto.
Ms Spearing said: "Horse riding has become a tradition in the area. It has helped a lot of children settle down."
The project won an online poll ahead of four other finalists: London Boxing Academy, Coping Through Football, Street League and Capoeira Youth.
Reader views (3)
"Here you go, here is some money for behaving decently like the rest of us."
are you aged between 8 and 13, then again judging by some of your comments the answer is probably yes!
- Cee, London, 09/07/2009 15:06
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Here you go, here is some money for behaving decently like the rest of us.
- Frank, Home Counties, England., 09/07/2009 13:11
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This is all very well, but while knife and gun crime has been reduced in the area, incidents of cattle-rustling have gone through the roof.
- Keith, King's Cross, London, 09/07/2009 13:01
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