Annual gift campaign brings joy to families struggling this Christmas

Leeds City Council’s Child Friendly Leeds (CFL) team is once again running a ‘Christmas Gifting’ campaign to help thousands of children and young people in need in Leeds.  

The annual drive sees the council working with community and public sector services to identify vulnerable families who may be struggling with the cost of Christmas and linking up with businesses to donate presents in their honour.

Last year, the initiative saw £18,600 worth of gifts handed out to over 2,100 children and young people in Leeds.

And this year CFL staff hope the campaign will be even bigger, with new businesses coming forward to spread festive cheer across the city.

Over 100 presents have already been distributed to families who attended a Christmas fair at Gipton’s Old Fire Station community hub, through donations from staff at First Direct in Leeds, a long-standing supporter of the campaign.

Fran Etherington, development manager at the Old Fire Station hub, said: “The Christmas Gifting initiative has enabled us to provide our community with gifts and a Santa experience that they may not be able to access elsewhere due to the financial pressures of the cost of living crisis and continuing high fuel and food prices.

“With so many of our families living in poverty in this area, people are very limited in what gifts they can afford – and some cannot buy any at all.

“The generosity of First Direct and Child Friendly Leeds is appreciated and will make a big difference this Christmas.”

Others set to receive gifts through the initiative include children in kinship care – those looked after by family or friends in times of crisis – as well as Foster4Leeds families and teenagers experiencing hardship and poverty.

The city’s network of ‘clusters’ – where partner organisations work together with schools to support vulnerable families – will also receive over 100 gifts, after generous donations by campaign ambassadors Park Square Barristers.

One such recipient is the 2gether Cluster in north Leeds, where 37 presents have been given out to 13 families this year.

Colette Kurylo, 2gether Cluster leader, said: “We’re so grateful to be able to offer this to our families that really need it. Every year is amazing and helps take the stress away from parents and carers.

“We know in the past it’s definitely provided gifts to children who would otherwise have gone without and they’ve been able to go to school after Christmas and tell all their friends about their new toys and treats.

“As a cluster, we don’t have any funding to be able to do this kind of thing, so it’s really lovely to be part of this initiative and hand out such thoughtful presents to the children.”

Richard Sadler, senior managing clerk of Park Square Barristers, said: “Our barristers and staff take great pride in providing personalised gifts to support families in Leeds.

“There is a real excitement in the chambers when all the gifts pile up ready to be collected by the Child Friendly Leeds elves.”

Councillor Helen Hayden, Leeds City Council’s executive member for children and families, said: “Through our Child Friendly Leeds initiative and partners, we are able to understand where areas of greatest need lie in Leeds and it is a pleasure to be able to harness this knowledge to benefit some of our most vulnerable children and families this Christmas.

“This is our seventh year of the gifting initiative and I’d just like to give my heartfelt thanks to all the businesses who have generously donated to help bring much-needed festive cheer to these families.”

Donors and presents also include Trinity Leeds providing vouchers for care leavers, White Rose Shopping Centre’s annual ‘breakfast with Santa’, gift sets donated by Lloyds Banking Group, Grammar School at Leeds donating tailored presents for kinship carers and Leeds Rhinos donating 150 tickets to their Boxing Day game.

Fifty tickets to the Northern Lights spectacular at Temple Newsam have also been distributed by Child Friendly Leeds to recipients including foster families and ‘independent visitors’ – people who volunteer their time to spend with children in care.

Any schools, organisations or groups that would like to find out more about the annual gifting initiative can email the team at childfriendlyleeds@leeds.gov.uk.

ENDS

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Leeds City Council communications and marketing,

Email: communicationsteam@leeds.gov.uk

Tel: 0113 378 6007