I am writing the March 2025 Blog as the CEO of The Police Children’s Charity (TPCC) which is an entirely separate charity that we run alongside of our better known charity, The Police Treatment Centres.
I am motivated to make the TPCC the focus of the March Blog fresh from attending the formal full ceremonial funeral of PC Rosie Prior at York Minster on 13 February 2025. Rosie was killed on duty on 11 January 2025 when she stopped to help a stranded motorist, and both she and the motorist she was helping were hit by an HGV. I have to say that attending the Funeral was a very humbling and of course incredibly sad experience, as I saw up close and first hand both of Rosie’s sons accompanied by Rosie’s husband in the Minster, walking behind their much loved Mum’s coffin both up and down the aisle, and the full impact of the loss of Rosie on the whole family. I do not want to say too much more about the Prior family as they have appealed for privacy to attempt to start to process their grief after the loss of a much loved mother and wife, but I was hugely impressed by the dignity with which the whole extended family conducted themselves, and of course, how Rosie’s police family rose to the occasion with their show of support on what was both an incredibly sad but also uplifting occasion.
It is not a secret that the Prior family have been superbly supported by the North Yorkshire Police Federation throughout their grief, but they also nominated TPCC
as the beneficiary charity on the Just Giving Page set up in Rosie’s memory which at the time of writing, has raised over £11500 for our charity. We often describe TPCC as being there for families when the “Unimaginable Happens”, and I think it is testament to the memory of Rosie and the Prior family, that at a time of the most unbearable grief, they were thinking of others, and chose to nominate a fantastic police charity that aims to ease the financial pressures for the children of police officers in the face of life changing circumstances, such as the death of the police parent.
Fortunately, Rosie had signed up to TPCC, and as a donor, we will now bring both her boys on as TPCC beneficiaries until the age of 25 if they decided to proceed on to university. TPCC is a fantastic charity that provides a range of financial grants to the beneficiary children throughout their educational lifetime. These include, new beneficiary grants, weekly income support grants, seasonal grants, driving lessons, child counselling grants, higher education and school leavers grants, and several other grants. We know that these grants can never ever come close to compensating for the loss of a loved parent, but they do provide a small measure of financial relief at the most difficult times for families.
For some reason that I do not really understand, the number of donors to the TPCC has plummeted in recent years. It is an incredible charity that provides a superb range of benefits for the children (which includes stepchildren, adopted children, the children of partners from all current and previous relationships), where they have lost a police parent, or that parent has taken an early ill health retirement. There are also a range
of child counselling and Ex Gratia Wellbeing grants that the serving police officer and police staff donors can apply for. We genuinely hope that no child will ever need the support of the charity, but experience tells us that will not be the case, and we currently have over 300 beneficiaries that we support, and all of whom we are proud to have with us.
To sign up as a donor to the charity will cost you £1.50 per month or £18 per year, and you can sign up through payroll or direct with the charity by going to our webpage link : www.thepolicechildrenscharity.org
The annual donation is the rough equivalent of 4 posh coffees and is pennies. All of us hope that you will never need the charity, but if your children do, rest assured they will be able to access an unparalleled range of benefits that will provide huge financial relief and comfort at the most dreadful of times. If your children never need the support of the TPCC, then you will have the reassurance that you are supporting the children of colleagues through a difficult period of time in their lives, with a modest donation that you will probably never miss from your monthly household outgoings.
Do please have a look at our website for this fantastic charity, and then sign up, and persuade your colleagues to do so as well. I promise you that you will never regret it, and the charity will be there for your children if they ever need it. Policing by its very nature is incredibly dangerous, demanding and stressful. Not everyone will make it to the end of their career, but by signing up as a donor to TPCC, it helps us to help you and your children, and those children of your colleagues if and when they need the services of TPCC.
Thank you all for your support and do please pass this message round as many of your colleagues as possible.
Patrick Cairns
CEO PTC and TPCC
