‘This is really what Christmas is about’ - More than 600 Christmas meals delivered thanks to the Greenaway Foundation

Those were the words of Dr Neil Hart, the High Sheriff of West Sussex as he helped out the Greenaway Foundation on Christmas Eve.

For the past ten years, the foundation, led by Darren Greenaway, has helped deliver thousands of meals to financially challenged families.

And this year, with the help of hundreds of volunteers, was no different.

Editor Mark Dunford helped deliver food and presents on the day – see his Facebook live on our Facebook page.

On Christmas Eve, 602 Christmas dinners and more than 800 Christmas wishes were delivered to families in Crawley, Horley, East Grisntead and the surrounding areas.

Dr Hart, acting Crawley mayor Morgan Flack, Crawley council leader Peter Lamb, Mims Davies, MP for Mid Sussex, cllr John Dabell, East Grinstead’s Town Mayor, cllr Samantha Marshall, Mayor of Horley and Claire Coutinho, MP for East Surrey, were among the 150 plus ‘reindeers’ who helped deliver the presents and the meals to the families.

Dr Hart said: “One has to admire the organisation and volunteers who come along to put this together and we mustn’t forget the sponsors and Darren himself who co-ordinates it all. This is really what Christmas is about.”

Amber Villar, who is a public governor of the Sussex Community NHS Trust, has been volunteering with the foundation for three years. This year she helped buy the presents for the Christmas Wishes.

Mrs Villar said: “I have raised money for the last few year’s but this year I seem to have gone hell for leather and twisted people’s arms like I have never done before and I have gone out there and helped with the Christmas wishes because I cannot bear the thought of a child not having a present on Christmas Day morning.

“I just think it is amazing what they do and it’s a great cause. And I am proud to be involved.”

The fundraising to help make this all happen started in June and volunteers have been signing up to help out.

Darren said: “One of the biggest issues we have faced is trying to procure all the food. We have had to go to the supermarkets which have been struggling themselves because of nationwide shortages of oil, stuffing, gravy etc. We have had all the orders coming in and yesterday we had Sainsbury’s vans delivering the food for us to pack it all up.

"The Wishes are the hardest thing because they are for a specific child/ The children decide what they would like to buy and they we have had to go out and buy them, get them wrapped and then put in the system to go out with the right amount of food. Some of the schools only got their nominations to us mid-December so we had less than a week to buy 800 plus presents. We have had some real heroes amongst the volunteers. We had three people going out to buy the presents. Helping today we have 150 ‘reindeers’ delivering so it’s a fair few people giving up their time to help.

“I would love to say thank you to all the volunteers and the elves, some of who have been helping for over a month. The Reindeers who are delivering the meals, and our sponsors.

“And also thanks to my team at Greenaway Residential. We have been decimated with Covid, we have been down to one member of staff in each office for the last two weeks so they have had to really step up and work a lot of over time.”

Ryan Sallows, business manager for Oriel and one of the foundation's trustees, said: "We were approached by Darren about being as a host venue and the school has the facilities to be able to house all the food and presents.

"It is an amazing achievement. And it’s not only his team but all the volunteers who turn to wrap presents and to deliver food, it's incredible.

"As long as we can accommodate everything we will support it for as long as we can."

To find out more about the foundation, visit greenawayresidential.com/Charity