€7m Lotto winners save local playschool

A golden-hearted Cork couple who scooped a €7m fortune on the Lotto, have donated €50,000 from their windfall to save a community playschool from closure.

Pat Broderick from Kinsale became the country’s wealthiest postman just over 10 months ago when his lucky numbers made him an overnight multi-millionaire.

Up to then his wife Mary, 45, had spearheaded a challenging campaign to secure the future of the seaside town’s community playschool, which was facing closure because two primary schools on whose grounds the facility was located were in the process of amalgamating and needed the space.

Mary, a former childcare manager at the playschool, had launched several fundraising and awareness efforts in an unlikely bid to raise enough money to secure a new premises for the 40 children before the lease expired at the end of last year.

And last March, in her first interview after winning one half of a bumper €14m jackpot last March, she pledged she “wouldn’t let the kids down”.

True to her word, she has kept her promise and donated €50,000 to buy a new, state-of-the-art prefab building, which the staff and children relocated to last week.

And unlike her husband Pat, who quit his old job as a postman in Kinsale soon after the colossal win, the kindhearted mother-of- four, who is a devout Catholic, has continued to work part-time at the playschool — for free.

A family friend said yesterday: “This was a project very close to Mary’s heart long before she won the Lotto. She was extremely worried about the future of the playschool and had spent a long time raising awareness about the issue and organising fundraising campaigns.

“The facility receives funds from the local health board, which helps with running costs and enables it to charge a reduced rate than normal to parents of the young children who go there.

“But there just wasn’t enough money available to buy or lease a new premises and she was desperately worried that these children would lose out and have nowhere to go, because many of their parents just wouldn’t have been able to afford to send their kids anywhere else.

“But it’s turned out very well. The prefab is great and it’s located at a site at the 10-acre Saile Project, which is a community-run sports and recreational facility near to the old premises.”

The friend added: “Mary’s a very modest person and wouldn’t be the type who’d be looking for credit for this, but she deserves it.

“I don’t think she’d have had much change out of €50,000 after the prefab was bought and fitted out.

“Without her, the community playschool probably wouldn’t be here today. It’s something that will always play a big part in her life and she’s still involved there on a voluntary basis.”