A youth project for five villages has received £8,000 from the owner of one of Oxfordshire's leading employment agencies as part of the company's 25th birthday celebrations.

Tracy Hoodless, founder and director of the Champion Recruitment Agency, from Sutton Courtenay, has given £8,000 to help the Damascus youth project and £2,000 to the village hall.

She has previously donated £100,000 to the new children's hospital in Oxford, £60,000 for resuscitation machines to help babies and children with heart problems and £30,000 to the Helen and Douglas House hospices in Oxford.

She has also sent £30,000 to the Bobby Moore Fund for research into bowel cancer and £30,000 to the Steve Redgrave sports foundation. Mrs Hoodless said: "Damascus does excellent work for young people and is a great credit to the founders."

Young people thanked Mrs Hoodless at a special five-a-side football tournament at the Milton Park Club in Milton village. The Damascus project was launched three years ago. It is funded largely by a grant from the Big Lottery and helps young people in the villages of Drayton, Appleford, Milton, Sutton Courtenay and Steventon.

One of the founder members Rita Atkinson said: "We would like to thank Tracy so much for her extremely generous donation, part of which has been used to buy a fantastic new sports kit which will be worn by a lot of proud, young people.

"This is a team of young people who have grown up in the villages and are now being supported as they start putting something back in to the community and set examples for other young people."