Simon and Nick Butler with their respective businesses Barn-Store and The Lavender Fields, alongside Manor Colts FC, have helped raise nearly £3,000 to fund a minibus to take vital supplies to Ukraine.

The Butlers have a history of fundraising for Ukrainian charity Chernobyl Children’s Lifeline – one of their tenants at Hartley Business Park/The Lavender Fields.

This included their Red 35 appeal, highlighting the 35th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 2021, and the long-term health and contamination effects still felt in Ukraine.

When the war started last February, the Butlers wanted to try to help those in need in Ukraine and teaming up with Manor Colts, the club Simon’s son Jamie plays for, decided to launch an appeal to do what they could.

They have since raised almost £3,000 thanks to fundraising, generous donations from many kind individuals and organisations including the Worldham Parochial Church Council, The Hampshire Equine Clinic, The Three Horseshoes and The Selborne Arms, and a cake sale by Jamie and his friend Max, Shookies Cookies and many others.

Alongside Manor Colts, Alton Utd and Liss Athletic also donated football shirts for children in Ukraine.

The Butlers and Dennis Vystavvkin, chief executive of Chernobyl Children’s Lifeline, have been touched by the support and generous donations and have used the money to help buy a minibus that sends vital supplies and medicines over to Poland to then be taken into Ukraine.

The Butlers continue to support Chernobyl Children’s Life Line as they are one of the few British charities still going that have been working long-term in the region, working there since 1992.

The charity is run by Mr Vystavkin and a handful of staff in the UK and in Ukraine, and nearly all its main fundraising and work is carried out by a team of committed volunteers, meaning the vast majority of spending is going right to where it needs.

Visit the website https://www.ccll.org.uk/ for more information.