Roy is the secret Santa

Secret Santa Roy Taylor

Oldham’s secret Santa who has thrilled shoppers by handing out envelopes containing £10 notes has been revealed.

Roy Taylor has been spreading Christmas joy in Oldham with his special envelopes since 2003, and this year his secret is out.

When an anonymous Chronicle reader wrote to us telling of how an unknown man had given him an envelope, blank other than for the words N-Joy with a £10 note inside, he couldn’t believe his luck.

The reader said: “I was beginning to lose faith in society as a whole. I just want to take the opportunity to thank this person for their act of kindness, as it has put a smile back on my face and restored my faith that kindness exists.”

But when we appealed for Chronicle readers to get in touch if they knew the man, who we’ve nicknamed “Santa”, one woman didn’t have to look far.

Karen Kirkpatrick’s dad, Roy Taylor, has been carrying out the festive favour for years, originally not telling his family about his charitable gesture.

They eventually found out, and thought he’d given up dishing out the tokens.

But after reading the Chronicle’s story on Thursday, Karen knew dad was up to his old ways.

She said: “When we found out what dad had been doing we were quite surprised because we had known nothing about it. Then we saw the story in the Chronicle and we just knew it would be him.

“He’s always said it’s just something he wants to do. He doesn’t do it for recognition or anything like that, he just likes doing it.

“It makes Christmas special for people, it’s a very sweet thing for him to do.”

Roy (67), a retired great-grandfather who lives in Shaw, was touched by the reaction of the reader who wrote to us.

He said: “It’s nice to know I had that effect on someone. It’s great to know I’ve made someone that happy.”
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