Child charity in appeal for more funds
X Factor winner Sam Bailey and veteran broadcaster Dame Esther Rantzen joined forces to urge people to support the Childline charity.
They were both at the NSPCC headquarters in Beaumont Leys, Leicester, to meet volunteers and urge more businesses and individuals to support the charity.
Childline, which Esther set up 32 years ago, is now the biggest counselling service in the world, helping more than a million youngsters a year deal with trauma and crises. But, last year, about 175,000 phone calls and online chats went unanswered because the charity cannot cope.
The demand for the service is growing. In the East Midlands, more than 29,000 children called 0800 1111 last year to speak to Childline counsellors – up from about 25,500 the year before.
Esther said: “We are a unique service and we cannot meet the need. Finding and training our wonderful volunteer counsellors costs money, as do our premises and the phone calls.”
She said the service was facing new challenges all the time.
“We have more suicidal children than ever getting in touch with us,” she said.
“Parents today are busier and busier with demanding jobs to pay the bills and young people are relying on social media that just gives them an illusion of friendship and often just makes them feel unattractive and they start to self-harm and get eating disorders.”
Singer Sam, who is a Childline patron, said that she would have benefited from Childline in her youth if she had known about it.
She said: “Childline only started when I was about nine. If it had been there before I know I would have been a lot happier.
“It would have saved me a lot of heartache.”
Mum-of-three Sam said her parents both drank a lot when she was growing up and that led to her wetting the bed until the age of 11 and going to school smelling.
She said: “There was a lot of arguing in my house and I was bullied because I was the kid that used to smell.
“I believe children should have the opportunity of someone to talk to.”
To find out more about donating visit www.nspcc.org. uk/what-you-can-do/make-adonation. To get in touch with a counsellor, call 0800 1111.