Military charity founder receives award

The founder of a military charity designed to help bereaved families come to term with losses has won an enterprise award for his work with people through his important charity. 

Bill McCance, from Portsmouth, is the founder and chief executive of Portsmouth-based Forces Support, and The Portsmouth News reports that he has won the Natwest Business Special Merit Award for Social Enterprise at the Great British Entrepreneur Awards in late 2014. 

Forces Support helps families in a number of different ways, including offering emotional support to help them come to terms with their loss. As well as this, the charity helps with decorating in families' houses, and also assists them in the creation of remembrance areas within their own homes. It also provides children’s play areas and garden makeovers for the bereaved. 

In 2014, the news source reports, Mr McCance and his charity helped 67 families of military personnel who were dealing with loss. One of the most high-profile cases it has offered its assistance in surrounded the death of Lee Rigby. 

He told the news website: "Given the quality, calibre and achievements of the other nine finalists I really wasn’t expecting to even be mentioned. 

"Considering there are 161,000 charitable organisations in the UK and over 60,000 social enterprises it was a huge honour to be the only charity finalist on the night."

As well as the work that the charity does, Mr McCance has also set up a retail business that helps support and fund the good cause. In the years since its founding, this branch of his enterprise has become a multi-million pound business with 75,000 square feet of retail space and more than 40 staff in the city.