The Help a London Child Christmas Appeal 2008

The Capital Christmas Appeal is a seasonal tradition and has been for over 30 years. With this year’s Christmas Appeal we have decided to make a lasting impact on the Capital by helping one very special project.

That project is Missing People, the UK’s only charity that works with young runaways, missing and unidentified people and their families. We will be promoting and funding a free text service to help missing and runaway children for one year. We have supported Missing People for many years and we are delighted to be working with them again to create this vital service.

 

 

About Help a London Child

95.8 Capital FM’s Help a London Child improves the lives of thousands of vulnerable children living in our capital city. London is not only one of the wealthiest cities in the world, but it is also home to children suffering from abuse, poverty, homelessness, disability, and illness. Help a London Child specialises in funding grass roots projects and supporting their work to improve the lives of these children.

Every year we support over 400 organisations across the Capital thereby helping over 120,000 children.

Find out more about Help a London Child.

About Missing People

Missing People is the UK’s only charity that works with young runaways, missing and unidentified people, their families and others who care for them. Not only do they actively search for missing people and supporting those who are trying to find them, Missing People offer three other services: Runaway Helpline, Message Home and Identification.

Find out more about Missing People.

The project

The Christmas Appeal will support all of the costs involved with setting up and maintaining the Runaway Helpline text service. This specifically means: the cost of the texts to the Runaway Helpline, providing trained staff and volunteers to answer the texts, and promoting the free service and Runaway Helpline across London.

Missing People’s Runaway Helpline was launched in 2005 at Capital and is a 24 hour confidential helpline for runaways, offering help and advice to young people who have run away from home or care, or who have been forced to leave.

Last year 68,000 calls were made to the Runaway Helpline from young people in crisis situations, with conflict the primary concern in 24% of cases, homelessness in 21%, physical abuse in 8%, bullying at home in 4%, domestic violence in 3%, and sexual abuse in 2%.

 

How you can help

Donate
Send a message to missing and runaway children out there that we care this Christmas by donating whatever you can. 

Did you know that donating just £5 would pay for missing children to send 30 free texts to the Runaway Helpline text service?

* Make an online donation now *

 

Find out more about how your money will be used.

 

Donate your Mobile Phone

Donate your old mobile phone by bringing it into the Capital building in Leicester Square, to various London stores or send it to a freepost address. Find out more.

 

How the new text service will support London’s children and young people

The project will give individual and confidential support, via text message, to thousands of London’s children who are missing, have run away or are thinking about running away. It will ensure the free service is available (including the cost of the text itself), 24-7, every day of the year.

The service will support children who cannot afford a text or are in situations where a phone call could be dangerous, and help provide a vital crisis support safety net for London’s missing and runaway children. The service will also refer and signpost children to other services who can help further.

Many missing and runaway children in London aren’t aware of the support available to them, and so promoting the new text service is crucial.

David Edwards, father of Rosemary Edwards said:
"Rosemary ran away from home after a seemingly trivial argument and walked for 22km before hanging herself with baling twine. If only she had known about Missing People and their Runaway Helpline, maybe she wouldn’t have felt that she had only one option".

Alison Cowan, Director of Fundraising and Marketing at Missing People, said:
"Missing People is a charity that relies on donations so we are extremely grateful to 95.8 Capital FM’s Help a London Child for making us the beneficiary of this year’s appeal. We hope that listeners will raise enough for us to enable missing children and young people to get the support they desperately need."

Find out more about Missing People .

 

Thank you

Thank you for supporting the Capital Christmas Appeal and our campaign to fund a Runaway Helpline text service. Your generosity could help save a child and reunite a family this Christmas and beyond.