A LOCAL lifeboat station will benefit from a £4,000 boost thanks to Tesco's Bags of Help scheme.

Bags of Help, run in partnership with Groundwork, sees funding awarded to thousands of local community projects every year through sales of re-usable Bags for Life.

Each time a customer shops they are offered a blue token at the checkout, which is used to vote for the project they want their cash to go towards.

Every two months Tesco hands out grants of up to £4,000, £2,000 and £1,000 in regions across Britain.

Weymouth RNLI lifeboat station was paid a visit by community champions Debbie Lindoe and Pat Bates, along with store manager James Herring from the Portland and Weymouth branches of Tesco.

They handed over a cheque for £4,000 to the station's branch fundraising committee chairman Teresa Drage and RNLI coxswain Andy Sargent.

Miss Drage said: "This is a fantastic amount of money and I would like to thank each and every one of Tesco's customers who chose us as the charity to receive this money.

"I would also like to say a big thank you to Tesco for choosing us to be one of the charities for their customers to choose from."