QUESTION: If 60 Year Fives, three mums and one charity champion have two hours and give 110 per cent – how many Christmases can they transform?

The answer – at Millbrook Primary School in Grove anyway – is at least 10, and possibly a lot more.

Last Thursday, the children at Millbrook helped Wantage charity champ Ray Collins pack 10 of his famous Christmas hampers for the vulnerable and lonely.

Stuffed with mince pies, biscuits, chocolate treats, tinned veg, spam, shortbread and sweets, Mr Collins and his elves will deliver these hampers and 110 others to people in the area who would otherwise have a less joyful Christmas dinner.

Mr Collins said: "We had a fantastic two hours with 60 students giving 110 per cent to our cause.

"I'd had a sleepless night due to an annoying earache but the fantastic kids raised my spirits immediately and their energy and enthusiasm enthused me as well.

"There was no moaning, no arguing, no whinging or silliness just concentration, enthusiasm hard work and fun from all involved.

"A massive thank you to all the wonderful students from Year 5, the three mums who helped and to all the staff at Millbrook for allowing us to pop along."

Mr Collins, who manages Peter Ledbury electricals in Grove Street, Wantage, first started packing the hampers in 2012.

When it started, the hampers were essentially food parcels delivered by police to vulnerable local families.

Mr Collins saw an opportunity to help more people with the same method and expanded the scheme year on year.

This December, he and his army of volunteers have packed a total of 120 hampers.

Most of the food has been donated by Waitrose in Wantage, but individual shoppers have also donated trolley-loads of treats.

This year, Mr Collins will give about 50 of the hampers to guests at his annual Christmas Day dinner for the isolated or lonely at Grove Rugby Club.

Another 20 will be delivered by the police to families they know; 20 or 25 will go to Wantage's October Club for dementia sufferers and 15 will go to disadvantaged families in the Wantage area.

Mr Collins said this year's donations, which totalled about 22 supermarket trolleys at Waitrose, were the most ever given to the hamper appeal, and he had once again been blown away by Wantage and Grove's generosity of spirit – especially the pupils at Millbrook School.