Eddie Hobbs: "Make a Difference and Donate Your Old Phone to the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation!"

Eddie Hobbs: "Make a Difference and Donate Your Old Phone to the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation!"

Celebrity broadcaster Eddie Hobbs is today urging people across Ireland to donate their old and unwanted mobile phones to raise funds for the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation. The award-winning charity is aiming to collect 100,000 phones this year. 11,000 phones have been collected since the campaign launch last month. Mobiles can be donated today by calling FREE on 1850 525 545.

Foundation Patron Eddie Hobbs comments, "We're not asking for your money, we're asking for something so many people have lying around their homes or workplace and would otherwise throw away – old mobile phones. The Jack and Jill Children's Foundation receives funds for every phone donated, money we can use to fund a new paediatric nurse or buy life-saving equipment. Call our free phone number today – 1850 525 545 – and when you receive the freepost envelope please do send in the phone. You can make a difference."

The Jack and Jill Children's Foundation was launched in 1997 by Jonathan Irwin and his wife Mary Ann O'Brien after they discovered during the tragically short life of their son Jack that there were virtually no state services available to provide for babies with severe developmental problems, including cerebral palsy. The Foundation today provides 24 hour care for sick children and support to their families throughout Ireland. Please see http://www.jackandjill.ie/ for more information.

It is estimated that there are more than 15 million old and unwanted mobile phones in Ireland. Every year millions more phones are replaced with new models. At present less than one in 25 are recycled.

Phones can be donated by calling 1850 525 545 to request a freepost recycling envelope. People with more than 15 phones to recycle can also request a free courier collection. Further information can be found at www.folamh.ie

All mobiles collected by the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation are put to good use. They first undergo a series of safety and quality checks. All phones in good working order are then shipped to developing countries in Africa, where the demand far outstrips the supply of affordable new models.

Damaged phones, meanwhile, are stripped down to their individual parts and recycled. Faulty batteries are sent to a special processing plant in France where they can be safely disposed of according to strict environmental guidelines.

Recycling is important as phones contain toxic substances including lithium and nickel. One cadmium battery can pollute up to 600,000 litres of water. Phone recycling could save over 1,500 tonnes of landfill space. Phone components are also useful – Gold, platinum, silver and copper can be extracted and reused from old phones. Nickel from batteries is used to make new saucepans, for example, and plastic from the casings is used to make road cones and watering cans.

Notes to editors
For interviews and photographs please contact Guy Cookson, PR Manager
T: 086 824 3900 or guy@folamh.ie, 30 Dunsoghly Park, Ratoath Road, Finglas, Dublin 11.

About the Jack and Jill Children's Foundation
The Jack and Jill Children's Foundation (registered charity number CHY 12405) provides early intervention home respite to families with babies up to the age of four with severe developmental delay, who require intensive medical and nursing care.