RNIB legacy donation funds audio services

The Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIB) boosted its Talking Books service with a £450,000 legacy donation.

The money, gifted by Doreen Gough in honour of her late husband, Derek, will fund three new recording studio pods and a public library engagement project. This will be aimed at improving awareness and accessibility to its library of 40,000 audio books within public libraries across the UK.

RNIB has named the Gough Pod – one of the studio pods – in memory of the couple, who found comfort in using the Talking Books audio library together.

Lorna McPherson-Reed, head of legacy fundraising at the RNIB, said: ‘Over one third of our work is only made possible thanks to the generosity and kindness of people like Doreen, who choose to leave gifts in their will.