Oxfordshire fundraising organisation Est. September 2007 Founded by Andrew Baker MBE BCAv
​Changing, Transforming and Saving Lives across Oxfordshire | Thames Valley Charity of the Year 2020
​Patrons: Dr Winston Ellis & MP David Johnston OBE | hello@play2give.org.uk
Play2Give - Thames Valley Charity of the Year 2020
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'Hats off' to Andy with special date at the Palace

4/29/2018

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PictureAndy with Jackie Billington, the Mayor of Didcot, who nominated him for the honour to attend a Royal Garden Party
Our very own founder has been Royally recognised for his outstanding contribution to charity with an invite to a very special date at Buckingham Palace this summer. 
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Andy Baker BCAv has been recognised for his dedication to charitable giving for half of his young life with a very special lucky ticket to one of Her Majesty The Queen's annual Royal Garden Parties.

Andy was nominated late last year in recognition of his tireless work, including founding Play2Give, to help others over a 16-year period since he began fundraising aged 14, in 2003. He has raised £90,000 to date!

He was selected by judges at the Palace, amongst thousands of lucky others across the country, to attend recognising valuded contributions to the life of their local communities.

Andy will attend the momentous occasion with his biggest supporter of all, his mum, Ann, on Tuesday June 5. The invitation to attend and on June 5th is extra special as Andy turns 30 on that day, and for Andy it feels extra special after dedicating half of his life to help others.

Andy said: "To receive such a special honour as the garden party it is truly lovely and it feels really amazing and humbling. Never in a million years would I thought I would be going to the big palace in this way.

"Everything I have done and achieved over the past 16 years has been a truly fantastic 'team' effort and I am lucky to have and continue to have such amazing support. I want to thank each and every team player and all who continue to support and get behind  Play2Give so well and June 5th will be a lovely tribute and every single one of them.
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"It's not very often you get to meet the Royals so I am very excited as is my Mum although nervous and I cannot wait for this great and special day and meeting any of the Royals - but in particular I would really hope to meet the most important lady, Her Majesty."

PictureThe golden invitation which landed on Andy's doorstep last week!
He added: "I feel really privileged and honoured to be recognised in such a way and I would like to give my wholehearted thanks to Jackie the Didcot Mayor who nominated me for this once in a lifetime opportunity. I never thought this would happen and it came as a total unexpected surprise in the post - a lovely surprise, a very emotional moment."

He was inspired to begin raising money as a year 10 schoolboy at St Birinus School in Didcot in early 2003 after undergoing brain surgery two years earlier, and through overcoming many health challenges from birth including a brain injury, where he spent the first few days of his life fighting for life confined to an incubator in the special care baby unit (SCBU). 

Andy was nominated by Didcot Mayor Jackie Billington in a process that involved the Lord Lieutenant of Oxfordshire. Jackie, who has long supported P2G since first meeting Andrew two years ago, speaking to the Oxford Mail, said: "I nominated Andy for a Lord Lieutenant's award and was then invited to nominate him for the garden party.
"I thrilled that he will be going along on his birthday - he has shown great dedication and commitment over the years."

Jackie is pictured above with Andy upon her recent visit to Headway last week.


Didcot's Courtney Hughes who set up the 'Secret Santa' initiative in 2013 collecting gifts at Christmas each year to distribute to local charities is attending the Royal wedding at Windsor Castle on May 19. 


  • Oxford Mail: Charity champion Andrew Baker gets Royal garden party recognition
  • Oxfordshire Guardian: Andy's date at Buckingham Palace

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Full steam ahead thanks to  Didcot Parkway

4/28/2018

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Didcot Parkway Adopts Play2Give!

We are excited to announce that Didcot Parkway will be supporting us with a charity day this June.

The team at the railway station will be holding a day to raise money for our 2018 appeal for local charities by holding a collection and cakes sale in the foyer on Saturday, June 16th.
The exact details and timings will be finalised and announced here in due course.

We are delighted that the station are getting on board and helping us make full steam ahead in our fundraising this year by adopting us to support. And the support is likely to continue into the future as well.

A huge thank you to the station manager, Kim Higgs, and ticket office's Liz Wood, for helping to support us. They became inspired to help us with our fundraising drives after seeing our video played to the audience, that they was amongst, at last November's Didcot BACAs ceremony, at the Cornerstone. Andrew was presented on the evening of the BACAs with a surprise and special 'Outstanding Achievement Award' which paid tribute to his many years of charitable giving.

We cannot wait and again we are thrilled to have a new partnership, especially one like the rail station where it is always a bustle of busyness with commuter. We at P2G just love making new partnerships and collaborating with businesses and groups.  After all P2G loves supporting our local community and local charities. It is what we live and breathe for.

We have raised over £73,000 for many Oxfordshire charities including the JR Children's Hospital since 2007 through many events and campaigns. We have no plans to slow down or stop, as we are currently working on new events with Boundary Park also in the town as we speak. 

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Giving the love of support to the tiniest of patients

4/25/2018

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Andy pictured with SSNAP Charity Director Emma Catrell, and some of the donations, given to SSNAP - Supporting the Sick Newborn and their Parents
Earlier this week, Andy paid a visit to the offices of the SSNAP - Support for the Sick Newborn and their Parents Charity with donations given on behalf of the tiniest of youngsters.

Earlier in April, the charity based within the women's centre of the John Radcliffe Hospital, put out an appeal for donations of activity and colouring books after their stocks had run low.  The idea of the activity books within the family rooms is designed to keep siblings entertained whilst their poorly brother or sister born within SCBU (that SSNAP exists to support) are confined to incubators. 

On Monday afternoon Andy was delighted to meet Emma Cantrell, the Charity Director, who hand over donations on behalf of Play2Give, pictured above, including knitted teddies in many forms and guises.  The knitted items will be sold for the charity and also given to sick babies.

The brothers and sisters of the poorly babies on the Neonatal Unit will enjoy these donations very much.  Our Andy was a SCBU baby nearly 30 years ago. 
Andy fought for life upon birth for many days with breathing (deprivation of oxygen) and feeding difficulties, after suffering a peri-natal brain injury.  Nearly 30 years on, he and his mum was delighted to visit the unit and see how a difference fundraising makes to those who come into contact within the neonatal unit.  Medical equipment in the 1980's was a lot different to today, when such specialised and high-tech diagnostic and medical pieces of kits didn't exist when Andy was born. 

SSNAP as a charity is dedicated to supporting the families of sick and premature babies. They provide emotional and practical support to those families, funding innovative and life changing equipment (for example essentials like breast pumps and reclining chairs for improved kangaroo care) and research fellowships ensure lasting change to how babies are cared for and treated in neonatal units here in the UK and around the world, thanks to leading researchers who carry out groundbreaking research. 

Andy and Emma of the charity are now exploring more ways to work together, and we are looking forward to plans of organising a family fun day together jointly to raise funds for SSNAP for the summer of 2019 in the grounds of the John Radcliffe Hospital. For Andy, another great example of another great way to give back to those who saved his life at birth. 
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Didcot Summer Fayre website launches

4/18/2018

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It's finally live! After weeks of immense hard work and compiling information together, the gleaming great website for the brand new Didcot Summer Fayre has launched today.

We are delighted to reveal the website, which launched this afternoon, thanks to our volunteer and Summer Fayre officer, Amanda Mann (who has put in many hard and long hours on this project), and to Josh Cox of Prystine Web Design, for building and designing such a fantastic site, which will go on to become a work of art for many years. Our Andy and Amanda are both leading this project, and are determined to see a packed park in August of town's residents.

Do please follow the event of the summer for Didcot where you can keep posted to all of the news and line-up for the event, and see what is already planned to take part!

Bringing Didcot Together, Play2Give and Sustainable Didcot are delighted to be co organising this brand new event for the town in partnership with the town council.

The Summer Fayre, on August 4, will see a fantastic great day of fun and entertainment across nine hours from 12pm. 

You can also check out the event latest on Facebook or on Twitter.
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Boundary Park Partnership

4/12/2018

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Boundary Park in Didcot supports Play2Give

We are delighted to announce a brand new partnership with Boundary Park. 

The park, on Great Western Park, which opened in 2016, is home of Didcot Rugby and Cricket Clubs, has a fantastic state of the art facility which overlooks the park with stunning views.

We are delighted to be chosen as their charity partner, after our Andy and Matthew, had an exciting meeting with the lovely new bar manager Rachael and her assistant Natalie, a month ago.

Together with the team there, there are lots of exciting fun events planned for the coming months, all to raise money for P2G to help our local charities we support. Some of the events will include regular quiz nights launching in September plus more plans of exciting events in the pipeline.

Keep it posted here for more news on this exciting new support and partnership with Boundary Park. We couldn't be more delighted to be their chosen partner. We look forward to working with the club and cannot wait to get the partnership underway, after they chose us as their first choice. 

It is not the first time Boundary Park have supported us, however. Last August they played host to our first ever family fun day, which took place at the Greenwood Way ground, which over the course of six hours, saw around 400 people attend and an amazing £1,440 raised for the Children's Hospital in Oxford as part of our tenth anniversary appeal. 
Throughout 2017 we ran our tenth anniversary appeal, raising close on £20,000 for the Children's Hospital and Headway Oxfordshire - a record amount!

The club also continues to support other local charities including Cystic Fibrosis Trust and Charity Secret Santa as part of their commitment to their local community. 

If you visit Boundary Park over the next two months please look out for some of P2G's donation tins on the bar. Any donations in spare change or notes would be much appreciated, to help us to continue changing, transforming and saving lives across Oxfordshire.

Boundary Park's Facebook page

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Support us in new charitable lottery

4/10/2018

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This Spring, be someone's sunshine... Support Play2Give to help others.

The SO Charitable Lottery is a new initiative created by South Oxfordshire District Council this year.

Set up to support local charities and community projects in the local area, SO Charitable Lottery operates on the principle of raising money within the community for the community.
 It empowers local good causes to raise money in a fun and effective way, at no cost. We are delighted to have Play2Give now signed up to benefit from ticket sales. Support us at our personalised page

A ticket for the SO Charitable Lottery costs £1 per week with 60p going directly to good causes - 50% to us, 10% to other good causes signed up and the remainder helps to finance this wonderful community orientated charitable lottery.

Each ticket at £1 per week has a 1 in 50 chance to win a prize each week, with a top prize of £25,000! That's a much better chance of winning than the National Lottery or the Health Lottery. 

Each ticket consists of 6 numbers and each number between 0 and 9. The draw will be every Saturday night - just like the National Lottery - when a 6-digit winning combination will be picked. Prizes will be given to players with tickets that match the first or last 2-6 numbers from the winning combination. Match all 6 and you win the jackpot! 

This lottery devised by SODC and its prizes is their way of putting the fun into fundraising. The real winners are the good causes such as ours, as 60p from each £1 ticket sold comes direct to all the charities like Play2Give signed up to the scheme. With the National Lottery only 28% goes to good causes - so the SO Charitable Lottery more than doubles the ticket percentage that goes to so many good local causes within South Oxfordshire. Causes like ours. 

Play2Give - We Change, transform and save lives across Oxfordshire. We raise money and awareness to support local causes, local charities and local people such as poorly patients at Oxford Children's Hospital to brain injury survivors to disabled children and those with ill health. 

Sign Up & Support Play2Give

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