Campaigning footballer Marcus Rashford on year when off-field goals mattered more Christmas Boable: TV barman tells festive tale to help homeless
Star voices tearful story
Still Game star Gavin Mitchell is hoping a story about the White House Christmas tree can help bring some festive comfort to Scotland’s homeless community.
Gav, loved by millions as hapless Boaby the Barman in the TV comedy series, has teamed up with American indie
outfit Los Straightjackets to record The Odd Little Christmas Tree.
The story is a gentle allegory about inclusivity and hope, written by musician Ronnie Costley. Gav hopes it will help raise funds for homeless Glasgow City Mission, helping adults and kids coping with poverty and homelessness.
He said: “It’s a sweet, simple old- fashioned
Christmas story. I think we’ve lost track of what Christmas is, it’s all pressure and commercialisation. People have lost sight of what it’s really about, and a lot of people have fallen through the cracks, too, which is heartbreaking.
“I think this year has made us think about other people, but it has also made some folk really selfish. And I think it’s really important that we do what we can to hold other people up because it could be any one of us, as we’ve all found out this year.”
The recording, which can be viewed on the
Glasgow City Mission Facebook page and on Youtube, features artwork by painter Jim Doak.
Its creators hope listeners will donate to the charity at its busiest time of year providing food, clothes and toys to those in need.
The story features an American family in poverty, whose Christmas tree is the poorest in the neighbourhood, but whose care, nurturing and attention has remarkable consequences.
Gav said: “There’s a lovely gentle naivety, to it and I think it’s a Christmas story in the most traditional sense.”
Footballer and acclaimed anti-poverty campaigner Marcus Rashford has looked back on an astonishing year and what comes next.
In an interview with The Big Issue, the Manchester United star said that, 12 months ago, he had no plans to campaign to better protect children living in poverty but knew that he would at some point.
He said: “I always knew that I would one day have a platform to help children just like me, and an injury combined with a global pandemic just offered me the opportunity to look into it further.
“When hearing about the possible school closures, my attention immediately turned to those children most vulnerable – without school, I had no breakfast club, free school meal or after-school club.
“I needed to bring attention to that.” After becoming an ambassador with Fareshare UK in March, he campaigned to raise money to tackle child food poverty before calling on free school meals to continue through the summer holidays, and then the October break in England. In Scotland, the government had already committed to supporting children through the holidays – the SNP has pledged to extend free meals to all children if elected next year – but the England international’s campaign forced a series of U-turns from UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Rashford also had a message of support for Big Issue vendors, who struggled to make sales when streets emptied during lockdowns, saying: “It will get better, it will get easier. I read something on Instagram the other day that said: ‘This year I made you strong. Next year, I will make you happy.’”
Meanwhile, actor Christopher Eccleston, an ambassador for The Big Issue, told the Christmas edition, on sale now: “Here is a footballer who my children, who are eight and seven, can now aspire to be. They can aspire to be a footballer but also aspire to be Marcus Rashford, who is an activist and a wonderful human being...and a Red!”