Andrew Reynolds: The other reason that I wanted to give you those was because I wanted you to come along this weekend. It’s probably just worth reminding ourselves actually why we’re here this weekend.
Narrator: What makes Great Ormond Street Hospital special?
It’s got lots of toys and it doesn’t smell funny.
Is it that we bring hope to hundreds of thousands of sick children, many with rare and life threatening illnesses. Or that we provide practical help to desperately worried families.
My nurse is called Linda and she makes me laugh.
Narrator: Or simply that our nurses and doctors offer some of the best specialist care in the country. But what makes Great Ormond Street even more special are the people who help us day in, day out, so we can give desperately ill children that extra support and love.
My mummy lives with me here.
Please find a special place in your heart for Great Ormond Street Hospital and the children we help. Thank you.
Andrew Reynolds: What I’d like to do is invite on stage a gentleman from Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity. Would you please give a warm hand to Mr. Matt Forrest.
Matt, as you know, my friends and I have got together this weekend. It seems like only yesterday we were at Wembley doing this, about 18 months ago we raised some money. And it was particularly special to me, when you invited me up recently to the opening of that actual room, when we walked in those double doors and we thought, “Christ! We actually bought this! We paid for this. We made this whole thing happen!”
Matt Forrest: Absolutely. You’ve actually bought and people like yourselves bought, from the last Boot Camp an entire multi-bed ward at Great Ormond Street. This ward was opened last year and every single brick in the building was raised from people like you and people like Andrew.
Andrew Reynolds: Just amazing to see. Now not to be outdone, we thought we’d give it another go. So Matt, if you bear with me a second, we’ve got a little something again for you. Got another big check for you. Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve actually raised £400,000.
Just take a couple photographs with this guy from the photography studio. Thanks. £400,000! That’s just amazing isn’t it? Absolutely fantastic. Shall we just pop this here for a second?
Matt Forrest: Wow. What can I say? Can I just say a very personal thank you to Andrew Reynolds because I think this is one of the biggest friends that Great Ormond Street has ever had, to be honest with you. I mean, this is really…this moves mountains, this sort of money. We need to raise, at Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital, over £50 million every single year. The reason we need to do that is because we’re a specialist hospital. We’re not just treating for general conditions. We’re treating kids from all over the UK, and indeed abroad, for some of the rarest and most complex conditions. Some of those conditions can’t be treated elsewhere in this country. And we have those facilities under one roof. And there’s a simple reason why we have those facilities under one roof and that’s because of people like Andrew Reynolds and obviously people like you. Because every penny that you’ve contributed this weekend to being here at this conference is helping those children to get better. It’s as simple as that.
We can’t express our thanks enough to you. Over the next sort of five years, two-thirds of the hospital is being rebuilt. That will enable Great Ormond Street to continue to offer paediatric specialist care for generations to come. And the bottom line is, that kids come into Great Ormond and for some of them, or indeed for a significant percentage of them, it is their last hope. And thanks to people like yourself and to events like this, we get to send them home. So thank you very much indeed. As Andrew said before, the making money and the sort of contributions from individuals – it’s here to see. This money is made up from lots of contributions from people like yourself and we are exceptionally grateful. Thank you very much indeed.
Andrew Reynolds: Shall I just give you a hand off with this? You brought the van did you? Thanks very much. Let’s give him a hand.