'Santa doesn’t come to some households unless we help out': Bringing Christmas joy to Cork children
St Vincent de Paul volunteers Hannah Kiely and Denis Kenneally at the charity's toy warehouse in Cork. Picture: Jim Coughlan
Santa’s special representative in Cork, Denis Kenneally, threw open the door to St Vincent de Paul’s massive toy warehouse with a broad smile despite the biting cold.
Decked out in a Santa hat and a jumper emblazoned with an image of the main man himself, he had been there since 7.45am making boxes to stuff full of toys for children around the city and suburbs.
Inside, a busy team of volunteer ‘elves’ help Mr Kenneally sort out mountains of presents, clothes and food that arrived to St Vincent de Paul (SVP) South West by the vanload.
The warehouse on Victoria Rd in Cork city has been lent to the charity for the Christmas period.
And all of its cavernous space was needed for the thousands of presents that flooded in.
SVP will deliver presents to more than 2,500 children this year in Cork City and suburbs, many of whom would have had no Christmas presents otherwise.
This year was SVP South West’s toughest Christmas in decades, with many people forced to make impossible choices between heating their homes and feeding their families.
Some 1,150 calls for help were made per week to SVP South-West in October — a 30% increase on last year.
That figure was expected to reach a peak of 1,400 calls per week in December.
And the most significant increase in calls this year has come from lower-income earners in full-time employment, the charity said.
Crippling energy costs and soaring fuel priceshave placed severe strain on resources and the cost-of-living crisis has pushed lower-income earners further and further into the poverty trap.
Central Statistics Office data this year showed 10.1% of people were unable to afford new clothes in 2022 — a 8.9% increase from last year; and 7.4% were unable to afford to keep their home adequately warm — a 3.2% increases from 2021.
One in five children in the State is now living in enforced deprivation (20.1%).
Meanwhile, one-parent families (45.4%), people out of work due to illness or disability (42.7%), those who are unemployed (45%) and renters (34.1%) continue to face the highest rates of deprivation.
Mr Kenneally started as the youngest volunteer in the Blackpool SVP volunteer group and left when he was one of the oldest, although he still drives the toy warehouse each year and helps with church door collections.
From visiting thousands of deprived homes over the years, he knows the impact of SVP's Christmas toy drive.
“From going to those houses, you know what a difference these presents will make. Sometimes you’d go into big houses but the people would be living in poverty,” he said.
“I fill up these bags, then I add in some extra toys,” Mr Kenneally says with a smile.
Huge crates on wheels are lined up to receive the presents whenever a loaded van pulls up outside.
A giant green crocodile see-saw, scooters, footballs, Barbies, books, baby dolls, Sylvanian Families and model trains are unloaded by the bagful and wheeled on the giant crate into the even larger sorting room out the back.
Toys are piled more than 1m overhead some days, Mr Kenneally says, but they try to keep a speedy system going so bags of toys are sent out for delivery soon after they’ve come in to be sorted.
And sorting the huge array of toys is a well-oiled operation.
Signs saying age and sex, like ‘girls, age 4-8’ are stuck to the walls over each giant table, made specially for SVP by Meitheal Mara some years ago.
The tables are then stacked with age-appropriate toys, and boxes full of everything from high-quality footballs to teddybears are tucked underneath.
Local SVP volunteer groups, known as ‘conferences’, will ascertain what families need and send lists accordingly.
“We have a pile of wooden toys here for more sensitive children, there’s nothing on these toys that could cut them,” Mr Kenneally said.
“One little boy had been up in Crumlin for cancer treatment. We wouldn’t give him a scooter but we’ll give him something he can use,” Julie-Anne Ramsell Kelly, SVP regional vice-president, said.
“We’d be creative with what someone needs.
“And we get requests for specific toys from families. So every year we’ll be on the hunt for certain things and once we find them, we can deliver them to that family.
“We appeal to the people of Cork, to businesses for the toys. We give them a tag with a child’s age on it and they go and buy something for them. So what’s coming in will mirror the needs of what children want.
“With the cost-of-living crisis at the moment, the need is greater than ever to give children a happy Christmas. We have to look after families.
“We’d have a lot of families who are foster carers who might have a lot of kids at this time of year.
“And some people just can’t manage.
“But people are so generous. A lot of companies will do a collection themselves. We’ve gotten a lot of food this year. Food poverty is real thing. Addiction can be a problem in households.
"We do some hampers where we know a 13-year-old can manage to make something with it for younger siblings, make sure they have food for school lunches, snacks, things that can be warmed, beans and peas, things like that. We do that throughout the year, but the toys are only at Christmas.
“Sorting the toys is a lot of fun.
“We might get a call saying ‘I need a Paw Patrol tricycle.’ So we’d be looking out for that for a specific child.
“Hula-hoops seem to be a big thing this year, and they’re all glittery and sparkly.
“And no matter how old the kids are, we want them to have something under the tree. Even if it’s a GameStop voucher or sports shop voucher for a teenage boy, we want them to get something.”
While smaller companies might take 20 tags with the first name and age of the child on it to buy for, larger companies like VMware, Apple and Stryker will take thousands of these tags and return thousands of presents.
Despite the cost-of-living crisis, the people of Cork have been as generous as ever in this year’s toy appeal, she said.
“The public always got behind St Vincent de Paul. Irish people traditionally were very good to their neighbours, they’d stop in to bring them food or gifts if they knew they were struggling and what SVP does is an extension of that really.
“We’re the oldest charity in the country and people like knowing that by helping SVP they’re helping people in their area.”
Delivering the toys is a sensitive affair, with SVP volunteers creeping up to houses when children are out at school or tucked up in bed so that parents can hide them undetected.
“One year I delivered a bag to Grange. The mum said she’d hide the presents in the hot press. When I left I remembered there was a cake in that bag! She rescued it before it had melted over everything!”
Mr Kenneally said despite volunteering for 40 years, he still loves doing it.
“I get great satisfaction knowing that all these kids are getting these presents at Christmas,” he said.
He will work right up to Christmas Eve, sorting through hundreds of vanloads of toys.
“One year a family took the presents that were already under their tree and brought them into us to donate, the children gave their own presents away to others.”
Although there were three volunteers in the toy warehouse on Thursday, on Saturday there will probably be 20.
“People come in the evenings when they’ve finished work, or at weekends,” Mr Kenneally said.
“The weather this year has stopped some people from coming though,” he said.
Volunteer ‘elves’ Evan O’Donovan and Hannah Kiely obligingly got into the Christmas spirit, donning jolly Santa hats as they sorted presents and lifted boxes.
“I don’t start work until later today so I thought I’d come in and help this morning,” Evan said.
Hannah said she really enjoys helping at the toy warehouse.
“With everything happening in the world now, with all the bad things like the war in Ukraine, it’s good to know that you’re making someone happy this Christmas,” she said.
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