Why are people so cruel to the kindest man in Britain?
Every day for a year Luke’s done a good deed for strangers. His reward? Gratitude, yes. But also suspicion, mockery — and abuse
BeING Britain’s nicest man isn’t always a breeze. For a start, you’re up against the nation’s ingrained cynicism: after all, who gives anyone something for nothing these days?
Well, actually, Luke Cameron does. He does a good deed every day. He’s on a mission to make our hearts soar, to dispel gloom, dispense joy and make the world a lovelier, more generousspirited place.
But sometimes people are loath to accept his kindness. ‘They suspect a catch,’ he says. ‘They can’t believe I just want to make them happy.’
He remembers the day he spent in a Cotswold market town trying to spread some cheer. ‘I had a £20 gift voucher and I saw three women — a mother, granny and her granddaughter — walking towards me. I smiled and said: “Hello ladies! I’m not trying to sell you anything. I’d like to give you this,” and I held out the voucher.
‘The grandmother put her arm across her granddaughter to prevent her from taking it. She said, “I’m not buying anything. What do you want?”
‘I told her: “No, really. I’d just like you to have this, to buy yourself something nice. There’s no trick, nothing I want in return, except for you to do a kind deed for someone else.”
‘But she was still sceptical. I felt nervous but I stood my ground. I told her about my project to do a good deed every day for a year. It took me 40 minutes to persuade her I was genuine, but by the end she was in tears. She said: “I just wish I had a grandson like you.” I felt triumphant. She’d been the hardest nut I’d had to crack.’
Luke, who turned 26 this week, blames ‘Britishness’ for people’s reticence. ‘We have this sense of reserve and embarrassment,’ he says. ‘And we’re besieged by requests to donate our money. So of course there will be people who are suspicious and don’t want to accept an act of genuine altruism.
‘My generation in particular has become so self- obsessed. We’ve forgotten to care about other people. But I’m trying to change the way we think. I hope there will be a shift in our views little by little; that one day we’ll come to accept kindness as the norm.’
Luke has already won legions of converts, with his blog, The Good Deed Diary, being ‘liked’ by 13,000 people.
He started his daily good- deed project as a New Year’s resolution on January 1 this year. However, his first effort was not well-received.
‘I went into Cheltenham and bought a sausage roll and a cup of tea for a homeless man. But he told me: “I can’t eat this, mate. I’m vegetarian.” So I bought him a cheese-and-onion pasty instead.’
Other kindnesses have been more warmly received. Luke has bought lunch for a colleague on crutches, baked lemon- drizzle cakes for his friends; swept leaves from an elderly neighbour’s doorstep — ‘at 101 she’s afraid of slipping’ — and given a £25 winning Lottery ticket to a stranger in a car park.
Sometimes he enjoys warm reactions. ‘I went to a KFC and decided to buy a meal for the family behind me in the queue. The woman asked why I was doing it. I handed her my business card, which says: “Dear Stranger, today I’ve carried out a random act of kindness. All I ask is that you do one for someone else in return,” and she was delighted.
‘She said: “It’s my daughter’s sixth birthday. You’ve made our day.”’
Other times, his munificence is anonymous. On the day we meet, he leaves £10 at a petrol station’s till towards the next customer’s fuel bill. His aim, tomorrow, is to break through the reserve of London Tube travellers and offer them sweets.
So how did Luke — a man of infinite sweetness and charm, who texts me after our interview to wish me a safe journey home — become so lovely? The answer seems to lie in inherent kindness and life’s experiences.
Raised with his sister Jess, 20, in Gloucester by their mum Mandy, 47, who works with adults with learning difficulties, and dad Mark, 52, who is in IT, Luke describes his upbringing as ‘lovely, close-knit and typical of a nuclear family.
‘We had roast dinners every Sunday, and my parents instilled the right values in us. They gave my sister and me a great start.’
WHeN Luke was eight he had emergency surgery for a heart condition. ‘ My parents had suspected there was something wrong with me,’ he recalls. ‘I couldn’t ride a bike or run without getting out of breath. I kept fainting.
‘After I’d had a very bad cough for a few months, I went to hospital, and an X-ray detected a hole in my heart. Apparently, I was a whisker away from a heart attack.
‘After surgery, I remember sucking on sponges in intensive care, being bandaged four times a day, giving a kid next to me my Game Boy because he didn’t have one, and another boy dying of meningitis. They said it would be months before I’d walk again but I was on my feet in three days; defiant, a fighter. I think the whole experience made me think: “Life is precious. I mustn’t waste it.”’
Humanity does seem to be hardwired in Luke. After grammar school, he went to Royal Holloway, London University to study international business management. While there, his close friend Danielle became pregnant and was abandoned by her boyfriend. Luke, who is gay, pitched in.
‘I thought: “She’s going to come and live with me.” I was with her for her baby’s birth — Bella is now five and my goddaughter — and I pretty much became her dad for a year. I would get home and babysit and go on hospital visits with her.
‘I hate clubbing and drinking, so I didn’t feel I was missing out. It was the best of times. We were a little family.’ He remains a supportive and close friend to Danielle.
After graduating, Luke won a coveted place on a John Lewis training scheme: at 21 he was the youngest trainee fashion buyer — and the only male one. He decamped to London with his partner and excelled in his job.
Then, four years ago, his fortunes turned overnight. He and his partner broke up and Luke was left temporarily homeless and ‘sofa surfing’ at pals’ homes. One night, i nadvertently locked out of a house by a friend, he sat on her doorstep in freezing rain until the morning.
Finally, he found a flat and moved in but had to leave a couple of weeks later because, unbeknown to him, the existing tenant had illegally sub-let it to him.
Luke then found temporary beds in hostels and hotels ‘ but I couldn’t afford the expense and was too proud to ask my parents for help’.
exhausted by the stress of his rootless existence, he broke down in tears at work. ‘It was just before Christmas. I had a chest infection. I was overwhelmed,’ he says.
He capitulated, gave up his job, and returned to Gloucestershire to live with his now-divorced father.
He WAS working as a barman for the minimum wage when he met, through a friend, the ‘ inspirational’ woman who changed his l i fe. They were unlikely chums — Maura was a Catholic mother of 11 in her 70s and Luke a gay man in his 20s — but he adored her. ‘She embraced me as part of her family and I loved her,’ he says. ‘Although she had little, she’d give away her last pound to someone who needed it.
‘She’d cook for her family — enough to feed an army — then make sure all the neighbours were fed too.
‘In September last year, she died of bowel cancer. She was 78 and so wellloved that 4,000 people came to her funeral. It was my first experience of death. I was bereft.’
Armed with the example of her goodness, Luke decided to ask for donations to a cancer charity instead of presents for his birthday l ast December. He raised £200.
‘Giving the money to Marie Curie Cancer Care gave me such a lift,’ he says. ‘ The sense of euphoria I’d got from being able to pay for a nurse to be with someone dying of cancer was far greater than the temporary thrill of opening a present.’
That inner glow stayed with him, and he decided he would carry out an act of kindness every day in 2014. To concentrate his mind, he posted his intention on a blog.
His parents thought his project was ‘ mad’; now they are thrilled and proud. But there are those who criticise him for sometimes giving indiscriminately to people who may not need his generosity.
Luke responds: ‘everyone needs kindness. Someone with £50,000 in the bank may have just been bereaved, and a small act of love can raise their spirits.’
His blog has been targeted by online trolls, who call him names such as ‘ selfish attention seeker’. Luke remains unfazed. ‘I wish I could talk to them. I’d like to think I could change their minds.’
He’s spent around £4,000 of his own money on good deeds, despite earning a meagre wage as a part-time shop assistant in a department store. He often goes without himself, and his bank account has been empty on occasions. Yet his kindness is unstinting.
Often it consists of just giving time to people. Luke recalls: ‘ A disabled lady on crutches came into the shop and I asked if I could help. She said she hadn’t worn a dress for three years, and wanted something special for a ball.
So I spent a couple of hours finding her just the right one in a lovely emerald green. I thought she deserved to be treated like a princess, to have a dress that really did her justice.
‘I said, “Please don’t feel you have to buy this but I think it will look lovely on you.” She tried it on and it did. A week later she came back and
said: “My husband cried when he saw me in that beautiful dress.” I just burst into tears!’
Although his efforts are entirely selfless, he’s learned that kindness brings its own rewards. For he’s just been appointed national philanthropy manager for Utility Aid, which helps charities make the most of their funds.
He starts in the New Year and will travel around the country in a car emblazoned with the slogan ‘The Nicest Job In Britain’ — helping 45 charities with fundraising schemes. He’ll be paid £35,000, more than he’s ever earned in his life.
The year- l ong post came to him through a stroke of serendipity. He had no idea it was being advertised until a follower of his blog alerted him to it. ‘You’d be just the person for this,’ she wrote, posting a link to the Utility Aid website.
After returning her thoughtfulness with a bouquet of flowers, he applied. He pointed out that as well as having a business degree, he’d got all the requisite experience. He’d been doing just the sort of work involved for the past year — only, of course, he hadn’t been paid for it.
For in Luke’s benign world, good deeds and charity fundraising go handin-hand. For example, he has created a special deck of cards called Cards for Kindness, which he distributes in return for a donation to the British Heart Foundation.
So far he has raised £750 for the charity — to which he is personally indebted following his heart surgery as a child. Each card suggests a simple act of goodness — eg, give someone a hug, make amends, take out someone’s rubbish — to brighten the recipient’s day. ‘The idea is that the card gets passed on so it creates a ripple effect: the kindness spreads,’ he explains.
Next year, Luke intends to renew his pledge to perform daily acts of kindness. By now, I suspect, they’ve become a way of life.
And his goodness is infectious: since meeting him I’ve been smiling at strangers, stuffing bank notes into charity tins and giving up my seat on trains.
Luke Cameron’s aim is to spread happiness. And I know that, in his own quiet, kind, insistent way, he is succeeding.