AddThis SmartLayers

Mail steps in to save hospice

The Birmingham Mail has stepped in to save a local children’s hospice from closure.

The newspaper has started an appeal to raise cash for the Birmingham Acorns Children’s Hospice in Selly Oak.

The hospice, which was opened by Princess Diana in 1988, needs to secure more funding to avoid cutbacks.

It costs £3.5m to run each year and only 15 per cent of that is provided by the NHS.

The rest of the money comes from donations and income from Acorns charity shops across Birmingham.

Chief executive John Overton said: “We just haven’t got enough to keep us solvent.

“We try to help ourselves and we have other money-raising irons in the fire, but even these aren’t enough to raise the other 85 per cent.”

Now the Mail has put its weight behind the charity by urging readers to pledge money to the appeal.

And to start the ball rolling, the newspaper has contributed £5000 of its own money.

The paper is also writing to 500 schools in the city to mobilise the thousands of schoolchildren into fundraising activities.

Editor Ian Dowell said:”We desperately want this appeal to succeed. Unless the Selly Oak hospice secures more funding it will be forced to abandon many families across the West Midlands.”

Back to the campaigns index

Do you have a story for us?
Ring the HoldTheFrontPage newsdesk on
01332 291111 x6022, or e-mail us now