#ESSEX LOTTERY WINNERS GIVE THE GIFT OF A GIANTGINGERBREAD HOUSE ON GIVING TUESDAY

29 Nov #ESSEX LOTTERY WINNERS GIVE THE GIFT OF A GIANTGINGERBREAD HOUSE ON GIVING TUESDAY

A team of National Lottery millionaires today handed over the keys of agiant Gingerbread playhouse to Hamelin Trust’s Roots and Shoots project in Rochford to mark #GivingTuesday.

With a combined wealth of £35 million, the National Lottery winners gave Santa and his elves a run for their money by working tirelessly to turn a simple wood cabin into a magical super-sized gingerbread playhouse for the charity. Hamelin Trust has received over £650,000 in funding in Essex thanks to National Lottery players. And now the Trust plans to use the new Gingerbread playhouse at its Roots and Shoots project for public fundraising events, before turning it into an extension of their tearoom project, due to open next year.

Roots and Shoots, based in Rochford, Essex, provides much needed training and work experience for adults with learning disabilities.

The lottery winners from across the region worked over 24 hours to create the Gingerbread inspired playhouse and fill it with gifts and toys for the charity and visitors to enjoy. Using more than 100 litres of paint, 60 paintbrushes, 30 rollers, 40 bespoke wooden shapes, 6 sacks of fake snow and 25 metres of twinkly lights, the finished product bought tears of joy to the Roots and Shoots team.

Ricky Cock, Project leader for Roots and Shoots said: “The timing of this amazing gift from local lottery winners couldn’t be better. We’ve just had approval to develop a new tearoom on-site which will use and sell fresh produce from the gardens here. The tearoom will open in the summer and our new gingerbread house will be a real draw to the site.

“It’s so exciting. We just cannot believe that all these people, who could surely be sunning themselves on an exotic beach somewhere, have instead picked up paintbrushes and hammers to give us a fantastic Christmas present.”Hamelin Trust is not the only project to benefit from the charitable multi-millionaire workforce. Three other unique Gingerbread playhouses have been created by National Lottery winners and given to projects on #GivingTuesday in Liverpool (Zoe’s Place Children’s hospice), Cardiff (Bobath Children’s Therapy Centre for Cerebral Palsy) and Stafford (Staffordshire Wildlife Trust). More than 60 National Lottery winners were involved in the makeovers, donating thousands of pounds in materials and gifts for the four charities.

Roots & Shoots has previously benefitted from National Lottery funding, receiving a £283,591 grant from the Big Lottery Fund to turn the empty 5-acre field in Rochford into a productive training project. The charity provides training and work experience in gardening and maintenance for approximately 40 adults and young people with learning disabilities, many of whom joined the National Lottery winners as they worked on the Gingerbread house.

Winners helping to create the festive makeover magic in Essex included locals Sue Richards and Barry Richards from Rochford (£3million in January); Julie Styles from Stanford Le Hope (£1.6 million in April 2012); Tracy Field from Benfleet (£2.8 million in August 2008) and Dean Allen (£13.8 million in 2000). They were joined by a team of hardworking lottery winners from across the region including Jean Swatman from Lowestoft who won £2 million in June 2013, Terry and Linda Vigus from Loughton (£1.2 million in May 2014); Richard and Cathy Brown from Ipswich (£6 million in June 2013) and Charmaine and Robbie Watson from Oxford (£2.3 million in 2005).
Essex carer, Susan Richards who celebrated a fine start to the year with a £3million win on a National Lottery scratchcard, was only too happy to help with the project and understands the significant challenges those with learning disabilities face on a day-to-day basis.

She said: “I’ve been a carer for many years, helping clients with an array of disabilities so I’m already very familiar with the work of Hamelin Trust however I didn’t realise that in total the organisation has received more than £650,000 National Lottery funding, including nearly £300,000 for the Roots and Shoots project, and all made possible by National Lottery players. While my life has been changed overnight with the win, it’s good to know that other incredibly important local projects just like this are also lottery winners.

“We’ve had a great time working with the project on the gingerbread house and I really hope this gift will help Roots and Shoots continue to grow and develop to help many more people in the future. The team here are an inspiration and deserve our support, I’m certainly going to be coming to the tea room next summer and stocking-up on freshly grown produce!”
The Roots and Shoots project is just one of thousands of projects in the East of England to benefit from National Lottery funding. Since the launch of The National Lottery, £1.6 billion has been shared with 28,000 projects in the East of England region, covering a diverse range of sectors from arts, heritage, sport, education, environment, health and charity.
#GivingTuesday is an international campaign led in the UK by the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF). It encourages people to ‘do good stuff’ for causes they care about following the shopping frenzy of Black Friday and Cyber Monday. More than 1,400 organisations including major charities and businesses are signed up to take part.