Stephen George is to leave the NSPCC after more than a decade to join a small cancer charity embarking on an ambitious growth programme.

The children’s charity’s development director will leave this month to take on a position of revenue fundraising director at Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centres, a Scotland-based charity which provides help, information and guidance to cancer patients and their loved ones.

George’s appointment is one of two top-level recruitments to the charity, with Glen Fendley, a major gift expert and co-author of the Institute of Fundraising’s Major Gift Fundraising Code of Practice, taking on the role of capital fundraising director.

The pair will oversee an ambitious expansion programme at Maggie’s, which currently has six support centres built on the grounds of NHS hospitals. Each centre costs around £3m to build and the charity has plans in the works to build another seven centres over the next few years, reaching a target of 23 centres by 2015.

The charity has already experienced significant growth, doubling it’s income between the period of 2004 to 2008, in which year it reported total income of just over £8.6m – a figure which will require a substantial boost if Maggie’s is to fund its growth plan.

Tricia Crosbie, a spokeswoman for Maggies, said that of the seven centres currently in planning, the two Scottish centres are fully-funded, while the new fundraisers will be charged with finding an additional £5m for the five centres planned to be built in England and Wales (£10m worth of funding has already been secured for these projects). “Maggie’s is at a really exciting stage. We’re moving from being a small charity to a mid-sized charity,” she said.

George said he is looking forward to joining the charity. “They are moving from being a small, innovative charity that punches above its weight to one with national ambitions and reach,” he said.