Festive treats for poorly tots

PARENTS Linda and Phillip Charlton played Santa when they took sackfuls of presents to children unlucky enough to be spending Christmas at the Royal Oldham Hospital.

The good Samaritans decided to make the special delivery after their three-year-old son, George, spent three days in hospital with a serious ear infection.

While that was during the summer, it made the Mossley couple think about how distressing it would have been over Christmas, so they decided to raise money to buy gifts for children on ward F3. Linda and her colleague Mandy Knight raised £521 from a dress-down day and a raffle at British Gas in Stockport were they work.

She said: “When George was in hospital a couple of years ago it was an awful feeling.

“I just could not imagine not having him home at Christmas.”