Monmouthshire Building Society is “honoured” to be supporting this year’s South Wales Health & Care Awards.

The 153-year-old institution sponsors the Care Hero Award and Volunteer of the Year prize at Thursday night’s ceremony.

The University of South Wales-backed event, hosted by Rougemont School in Newport, will see a total of 16 awards handed out.

“Monmouthshire Building Society was founded in Newport in 1869 to meet the needs of local people and has been providing mortgage and savings products for over 153 years since,” said a spokesperson.

“As a mutual building society, our members are at the heart of everything we do. Unlike banks, the society is owned by its members.

“With no shareholders, we are free to re-invest profit back into the society to benefit current and future customers.

“The society provides local high street services to members through a network of branches and agencies covering the M4 corridor, from Chepstow in the east to Swansea in the west.

“We’re committed to keeping our branches open to serve our customers – this year we’ll even be opening a new branch and office space in Cardiff.

“As a local society, we’re passionate about supporting our communities through our Branching into Communities programme.

“We hope that our community initiatives can provide help and support for our most vulnerable and disadvantaged local communities.”

And on supporting the sixth annual awards, they added: “Recognising that the past few years have been a challenging time for everyone, not least those who work in health care services and those who need the support of those services, we are honoured to support this year’s South Wales Health & Care Awards by sponsoring the Care Hero and Volunteer of the Year categories.

“Congratulations to all nominees and winners on the evening – you’re an inspiration to us all.”

For more information on Monmouthshire Building Society, visit monbs.com.