Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
DOSH OF THE DAY
Hospital canteen staff scoop £25m on Lotto & vow to spend winnings locally to boost town
A SYNDICATE of dinner ladies have quit their jobs in a hospital after scooping a £25million lotto jackpot.
But the women have vowed to use the £4,246,129.72 they each won to give a boost to their home town Port Talbot, where many have relatives at the troubled steelworks.
Julie Amphlett, 50, said: “Finally, some luck has shone on South Wales, but we won’t forget where we came from and realise how lucky we are. We won’t be moving and we’ll make sure we spend our money locally so everyone benefits.”
Julie and her colleagues at Neath Port Talbot Hospital – Louise Ward, 37, Julie Saunders, 56, Doreen Thompson, 56, Jean Cairns, 73, and Sian Jones, 54 – formed their Catering Girls Euromillions syndicate six years ago. They used to serve up meals to 270 patients a day, but are dining out after their numbers came up in Friday’s draw.
Syndicate leader Julie Saunders said: “We used to be dinner ladies - now we are winner ladies. I couldn’t believe it. It doesn’t happen to people like us.
“I had to find them all to tell them, because I had to speak to them face to face.”
She said she and her five friends would be having “one hell of a Christmas” before deciding how to spend their millions.
But Julie already has big plans to go on holiday to Las Vegas with Jean because they have “always loved Elvis”. Julie said: “It’s always been mine and Jean’s dream to go to Vegas and then on to Graceland.”
Jean, who retired from the canteen after 38 years service last year, revealed she was hoping she might bump into
We used to be dinner ladies, now we are winner ladies. I couldn’t believe it JULIE SAUNDERS LOTTERY SYNDICATE LEADER
Welsh crooner Tom Jones on the Vegas strip. She said: “I cannot wait to get out there.
“If one of the hotels wants to give me the VIP service, who am I to say no? I’d go there right now if I could.
“I suppose I could even afford to meet Tom Jones now – he is such a lovely, lovely man.”
Mum-of-two Louise, whose fiancee Mark Haran is a steel worker, is planning a dream wedding for March next year.
Louise, a catering assistant for 12 years, said: “We are not going to be silly, we are just normal people, it is not going to be bling or anything like that.
“We can just now make sure we can have everyone we love there, which is the most important thing to us.”
Before that, she will buy a new tumble dryer to replace the one that broke three months ago. Louise joked: “I suppose the first thing I could buy is a golden tumble-dyer.” It was her numbers that came up, and Louise said: “I was actually thinking about stopping playing earlier in the year because I’ve been saving up for the wedding in March and needed the cash.”
“Imagine if I’d stopped – we’d never have won.”
Sian, a grandmother who has been a catering supervisor at the hospital for 14 years, said she was too stunned to think what she was going to spend her winnings on.
But mum-of-three Doreen is planning a holiday to Florida with husband Nigel, their children and grandchildren.
Julie Amphlett, who has been a catering assistant for 32 years, said: “I want to buy absolutely everything, which means new house, new handbag, news shoes.”
The original syndicate had a seventh member, Moira, who died a few years ago. Jean said: “We worked with her for years but she was very ill, bless her, and she passed away.” The women played every Friday, buying their winning ticket from One Stop, Sandfields, Port Talbot. Their winning numbers were 5, 12, 17, 33, 41 and the two lucky stars were 4 and 9. The total jackpot was £25,476,778.30.
Canteen supervisor Stephen Thomas said two of the women rang in sick on Monday morning.
He said: “I had to come in early with another supervisor to cover their shifts. But to be fair, I’d have done the same. One said she was too stressed to work.
“I’d love to be stressed about winning millions of pounds.”
The 11 remaining staff might be green-eyed, but they are delighted for the women. One former colleague said: “We’re absolutely chuffed for them. It was just a syndicate they set up informally, it wasn’t like we were all invited to take part in it.
“We all used to do a bonus ball thing, where whoever picked the winner would win £49. I think one of them won it once. There are no hard feelings at all, it’s just nice that the money is going to a great bunch of girls.
“Word is they are going to treat us to a slap-up meal in a posh Michelin-starred restaurant for our Christmas party this year. “Either that or a trip to Vegas.” A hospital spokesman said: “We are thrilled for them, but we will be sorry to see them go.”
The Port Talbot steelworks has also hit the jackpot after Tata Steel yesterday announced a £30million investment in the troubled plant, which employs 4,000 people.
Tata Steel UK chief executive Bimlendra Jha said: “These investments will help us to increase our reliability and demonstrate our commitment to the longer-term future of steelmaking in the UK.
“We are also investing in our capability to produce new higher-strength steels in the UK.”