ITV’s News At Ten co-anchor Julie Etchingham is calling for people across the UK to go for gold with the People’s Millions.

The Big Lottery Fund is giving communities up and down the country the chance to win the public’s support in their region and share in £5 million of Lottery good cause money.

Five awards of up to £50,000 will be up for grabs in each of ITV’s 18 regions – a total of 90 awards across the UK and a potential quarter of a million pounds for each region for projects that improve and enrich the communities they live in.

Organisations across the regions have until 15 May 2008 to enter the contest. The finalists will be screened on ITV regional evening news programmes later in the year when the public in each region will be able to cast their vote for the projects they want to win the Lottery good cause cash.

Since the People’s Millions contest began four years ago, a total of £13.6m has been awarded to 229 community projects and more than 1.1 million people across the UK have voted.

Previous winners have used their awards on an array of projects from transforming local areas into community wildlife havens to creating sensory play areas for children with special needs. 

For more information visit www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/peoplesmillions