A NORTH East charity has finally achieved its 2020 fund raising goal to purchase a caravan for children with life threatening illnesses.

Unfortunately, with three lockdowns Bringing Back a Smile thought the possibility of reaching its goal by the end of 2020 had gone.

However, they dug deep and with hard work from its Founder, Kevin Hill, Director Mandy Brunskill, and Victoria Jewitt the charity rallied round with their team of volunteers raising even more money from raffles and online competitions.

It took just short of 11 months when they announced on Friday, February 12, that they had smashed their target of £30,000 despite the circumstances.

Bringing Back a Smile will be looking to purchase the caravan at Primrose Valley North Yorkshire as soon as lockdown is lifted.

The caravan is intended to give poorly adults and children a chance to spend quality time together, away from gruelling treatments and help bring back a smile.

One of the fundraisers, Chris Breward CEO of Wealth Of Advice, started the ball rolling with a challenge of running 20 half marathons in 2020.

It was a very difficult task with Covid and numerous lockdowns but after ten and a half months of hard work he completed his challenge and helped raise the charity a whopping £6,000.

The charity's sponsors including Hartlepool Property Management who donated £4,000 and £750 from EFT Architectural Fabrications and AKV Cladding.

Mr Breward of Wealth of Advice said: “We spoke with Kevin back at Christmas time and he said we were about £6,000 short for the caravan.

“We discussed what we could do, we pay some money each year to the charity to sponsor them and we thought this year it should go to the caravan fund.

“We gave them the money to make it up to £30,000 and as soon as lockdown is over we will purchase the caravan.

“If we can help poorly children to get a holiday this year after all that has happened then that will be great.

“We will continue to support the charity and we hope these efforts inspire others to fundraise.”

Mr Hill said: “I would just like to take this opportunity to thank my director Mandy Brunskill and all my volunteers that work hard throughout the year to make a big difference in people’s lives."

“I would also like to thank all of our sponsors that have supported the charity through very testing times and last but not least our supporters and the general public who always dig deep to help make a difference from the bottom of my heart thank you all.”