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Kevin Kennedy, who found fame as Curly Watts in Coronation Street, is today launching a new fundraising campaign to support his charity, Kennedy Street Recovery, which helps people to recover…
Kevin Kennedy, who found fame as Curly Watts in Coronation Street, is today launching a new fundraising campaign to support his charity, Kennedy Street Recovery, which helps people to recover from addiction.
Kevin and his wife Clare fought their own addiction battle and have now been sober for 24 years and set up the charity in 2020 to help others into recovery.
The charity is run by Kevin’s wife Clare, and recently opened a new Recovery Hub in the centre of Brighton, where people can find out about recovery, get coaching and support to stay sober and take part in self-employment workshops to help them build a new future.
Kennedy Street Recovery is taking part in The Big Give Christmas Challenge, a charitable fundraising week that runs from 29th November to 6th December, where every pound donated is doubled by their funder, The Reed Foundation and private supporters.
Kevin said “I know that addiction can affect anyone, regardless of age or social status, but it can be overcome with the right support in place, and Kennedy Street Recovery can provide that. We are hoping that people will give generously to our Big Give Christmas Challenge to support our life saving work.”
Any money raised will be spent on running costs for the Recovery Hub and pay for coaching and mentoring to help people into recovery and stay sober. Any donations to the campaign must be made during the Christmas Challenge Week from 29th November to 6th December https://donate.thebiggive.org.uk/campaign/a056900002NftUOAAZ
NOTES TO EDITORS
Kennedy Street Recovery is a charity, registered in 2020, but working in the Brighton since 2017.It was founded by Clare Kennedy, wife of Coronation Street’s Kevin Kennedy. Clare and Kevin have been in recovery for over 20 years.
Brighton and Hove Joint Strategic Needs Assessment 2019 identifies alcohol and drugs misuse as significant issues in the city. 606 per 100,000 people had alcohol related hospital admissions in 2016/17 and 41.9% of adults in the city are drinking over 14 units of alcohol a week, significantly higher than England and places the city in 4th highest place out of 149 local authorities.
In the last year Kennedy Street took 2487 helpline intervention calls and supported 560 people onto a recovery pathway.
The Recovery hub is open 6 days a week
The hub and its activities is supported by funding from Brighton and Hove City Council’s Community Fund, Sussex Community Foundation, Garfield Weston Foundation, The Postcode Society Trust, Ernest Kleinwort Charitable Trust, The Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner’s Community Fund, The Pebble Trust, The National Lottery Awards for All.
About the Big Give
Big Give runs the UK’s biggest match funding campaign, the Christmas Challenge. For seven days, it offers supporters of participating charities the opportunity to have their donations doubled. Founded by entrepreneur and philanthropist Sir Alec Reed CBE, the Christmas Challenge has raised millions of pounds for thousands of charity projects since it first launched on the Big Give in 2008.
The Christmas Challenge is a match funding campaign where donations to participating charities are doubled. The match funds come from two sources – charities secure some of these (Pledges) over the summer. The funds are then boosted by funds from a Big Give Champion who contributes to the match fund pot. The collective pot is used to double donations from online supporters when the campaign is live. #ChristmasChallenge22 // One donation, twice the impact.
Big Give is a registered charity (1136547) whose mission is to promote causes and inspire people to give through theBigGive.org.uk, a crowdfunding platform for charities specialising in match funding.
Big Give features over 10,000 charities and has worked with some of the biggest names in UK philanthropy which provide match funding, including The Big Lottery Fund, Cabinet Office, People’s Postcode Lottery, ICAP TP, Candis Club Magazine, EQ Foundation, The Reed Foundation, The Childhood Trust, DCMS and others including high-net-worth individuals.
Big Give’s annual flagship campaign, The Christmas Challenge, is the UK’s biggest online match funding campaign. The Big Give has also run several cause-focused match funding campaigns, including raising £2.6m following the Grenfell Tower fire in 2017 and £3.8m for the DEC Ukraine Appeal.
For media enquiries contact
Clare Kennedy – CEO clare@kennedystreetrecovery.org 07775 737314 or Clair Chadwick clair@causeuk.com 0753 194 8014