Newbury mental health charity The Charlie Waller Trust raises £10k just 24 hours into week-long Christmas appeal

A Newbury-based mental health charity raised £10,000 just 24 hours into its week-long Christmas appeal.

The Charlie Waller Trust is currently running its Christmas appeal and has raised nearly £40k of its £60k target.

From December 3 to December 10 at midday, all donations made to the trust’s appeal will be doubled, thanks to match-funding platform The Big Give.

The trust is hoping it can hit its £60k target so that the money can be used for its empowering parents and carers project, which will help co-produce a library of resources with parents and carers who have first-hand experience of caring for a child with ill mental health.

The trust’s fundraising development officer Beth Towler said: “This project is particularly important because the resources we help to create will be made by parents and carers for parents and carers.

“The appeal is off to a great start and we’re so grateful for the generosity of everyone who has supported it so far.”

The Charlie Waller Trust was created by the Waller family in 1997 in response to the loss of their 28-year-old son and brother Charlie – described as “a strong, funny, popular, good-looking and kind young man” and “the life and soul of every party” – to suicide.

It has since become one of the UK’s most respected mental health charities and its mission is to educate young people and those with responsibility for them – parents and carers, teachers, college and university staff and employers – about their mental health and wellbeing.

Anybody wishing to donate to the Christmas appeal can do so by visiting www.charliewaller.org and clicking the donate button.

Last year, the trust’s Christmas appeal surpassed its £50,000 target and even earned an award for their efforts, being named Best UK Charity by The Big Give, in part for its powerful animation demonstrating the impact The Charlie Waller Trust has on the lives of young people.