Tyne Youth & Community Centre

Chirnside House - Mariners Lane - Tynemouth - NE30 4AT

Telephone - 0191 2578796

Registered Charity No 522148

Thanks to the Prime Minister, The Rt Hon Tony Blair MP for making a call to Virgin Radio breakfast DJ Christian O'Connell on behalf of yours truly, Graham Marsh, on Friday 3rd November 2006.

The Who's calling Christian? feature culminated in an online vote by the public and the winner was announced live on air on Monday 6th November.

Did we have any doubt  that the PM and GM between them would scoop £10,000 each for my two nominated charities, namely The Freeman Heart & Lung Transplant Association (FHLTA) where I sit on the committee and of course, Tyne Youth & Community Centre.   The Freeman Hospital is where I had my heart transplant in 1999.

Well, err yes actually.   I am delighted to report that we secured over ⅓ of the vote to beat Liam Gallagher into second place and between us have won £20,000.

After I have taken £3,000 to cover my expenses for competing in transplant sport next year, which includes among other events, golf competitions in Engalnd, Scotland and Ireland and a trip to Bangkok, Thailand where I shall be representing the UK (and of course The Freeman Sports Team) in the World Transplant Games, the rest of the money will be divided equally between the FHLTA and Tyne Youth & Community Centre.

I hope to be able to hand over a cheque for £8,500 very soon.  

If you visit Virgin Radio's website you will be able to get loads more info on what happened.   The Number 10 Downing Street website had an item titled 'Vote for Graham' on it's front page yesterday.   There are also links to the Organ Donor Card register as well as this site, my personal website and Tyne Youth & Community Centre..

There is also a podcast of the highlights of the Who's calling Christian? competition which is available for downloading (whatever all of that means).

On my personal website there are many messages in my Guest Book  from all over the world.  

9th Nov '06:

This morning's post arrived with a CD from Virgin Radio with all the bits of my chat with PM Tony Blair.

It contains the original message to the station by The Prime Minister on my behalf, me chatting with DJ Christian O'Connell live on the Breakfast Show and then the unbelievable part where The PM calls the station live and Christian, him and I chatting.  

There is more.....

It also has the result as it happened and another chat with me speaking to Christian again.   This is all topped off with a compilation of some of the celebs who called in over the three weeks.   Finally, there is a short interview with my mate Tony which was played on all of Virgin's news bulletins where he thanked everyone and congratulated me.

How neat is that?

If any of you would like a copy of the CD I will gladly copy and send it to you, no matter where in the world you may be.   If you are a fellow transplant recipient and would like to use it in any fundraising or awareness campaigns that you may be involved with, feel free.

Obviously I will need your full postal address, so drop me an Email.   Use the link at the bottom of the page.

Friday 17th November:

My wife Christine and I were invited to Mr Blair's Sedgefield home to meet The PM, or as I like to call him, Tony.   We spent about 15 minutes  sipping tea and munching biscuits chatting with The Premier about the transplant games and sport in general, among other things.

He presented me with the cheque, as pictured above and said how glad he was that I was sharing the money with two such worthwhile causes and that he was proud and honoured to have helped.   He was of course delighted that we won the vote too.

I think Ron, up there in the great Club in the sky, might be very proud of what he started all those years ago and how it has evolved.

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