LIGHTHOUSE CRESSEX 2025 ANNUAL REPORT
By David Lidiard, Nov 2025
Lighthouse Cressex delivers a fun week-long summer holiday programme for children of primary school age run by local churches working together with our local community. Although we don’t have a specific catchment area, we expect to draw children from our local areas of Booker and Cressex. We have been running annually since 2010 and normally use Cressex Community School as our base. However, due to electrical works at the school occurring during the summer holidays putting a corridor out of action and possibly the loss of the internet the trustees have taken the decision to switch the venue to the Christ the Servant King church (CSK) premises across the road from the school whilst works at the school are ongoing. In 2025 we welcomed around 180 children on average aged between 5 and 10+ supported by approximately 150 volunteers of whom around half were teenagers. We also held Little Lighthouse for children under 5 and their carers attracting over 100 visits. Included in the 180 children were several with special needs, most of whom were able to be fully engaged with their age groups with some additional considerations and assistance ably provided by our volunteers.
Running Lighthouse in a smaller venue always gives some scheduling headaches and concerns about there being enough room to run the activities. With some judicial adjustment to the schedule and room allocation, use of Fernie Fields for sports, the purchase of 8 marquees, a car park that seemed to be like a tardis that not only housed 8 marquees (one for each age group plus one for craft) and the 8 portable toilets but also had plenty of space for games at lunchtime, and finally the fact that we were blessed with dry, calm weather the venue was certainly a success and everything passed off smoothly. Having marquees in the car park required overnight security but apart from the invasion by a few curious cats there were no issues. We are very grateful for the setup and take down teams for sorting out the marquees.
This year we continued with the special event for our young ‘red shirts’, aka teenagers, on 2 evenings of the Lighthouse week at CSK. Here the young people were able to relax from their day time responsibilities of caring for the younger children and have fun games, a café followed by an opportunity to discuss some of the deeper questions and challenges that life throws at us. We continued to see this very well attended and showed there was a real need in the community for events for teenagers. This is a great opportunity for our red shirts to get to know one another, have a fun time and make that transition from child into adulthood. Lighthouse provides a great training ground for our teenagers to take on responsibility and start to develop those all-important adult skills.
A new venture for us in 2025 was to split the 10s and 11s into 2 groups. The 10s had the normal agenda used across Lighthouse but for the 11s we used some material from Lighthouse High Wycombe to train the 11s to become Lamplighters in the future. This instils in them a sense of responsibility as well as still partaking in the normal Lighthouse activities, so training with fun! This went very well and we shall be repeating this in 2026.
Our mainstage continued with Dr Why and his time machine, the LARDIS. This time it took us back in time to various events in the old testament to meet the people involved and find out what it was like to meet characters such as Noah, Moses and David. The atrium and main stage were decked out with themed memorabilia by our talented props team and included an upgraded LARDIS from last year. On Wednesday we had a visit from a mathematical pirate who ran some tricky quizzes for the children to get involved in. This did not go as well as planned but we will continue with finding something novel for the children to be inspired by midweek. As always, our mainstage, where
everyone is gathered together, is a lively time full of singing, dancing, games, teaching and drama. After, the children separate into their groups for sessions of sports, drama, craft and learning together. The older children (9-11) have specialized workshops to suit their age group.
Although the weather was neither too hot or too cold we did have one wet day which presented a challenge for the sports team. In the event this turned out to be a great opportunity to run a dance session in the main room area where we showed dance move videos of well known pop songs for the children to perform. This was a huge success and very popular, particularly with some of our adult helpers!
The trustees are very grateful to our sponsors. Lighthouse is run on a voluntary basis and no charge is made for the week despite the number of drinks, biscuits and cakes consumed! Lighthouse mainly relies on contributions from a number of local churches and a small number of key donors. Despite not having a council grant this year we amazingly managed to cover all of our costs with a small surplus to use on 2026. Most of all we are indebted to our volunteers who provide time, expertise and energy to make Lighthouse Cressex happen, often taking holiday or unpaid leave to volunteer during the week. Despite being exhausted at the end of the Lighthouse week it gives the trustees and volunteers great pleasure to receive thanks from the children and parents who in themselves struggle to find activities for their children during the summer school holidays.
TRUSTEES
Jacqui Griggs Sharon Windsor Clare Lamb Edward Chidgey David Lidiard
Named Trustee Posts:
Treasurer – Jacqui Griggs Secretary – Ed Chidgey Chair – David Lidiard
Lighthouse Cressex
Financial Report 2025
For year ended 30[th] September 2025
Summary
This year’s Lighthouse accounts report a surplus of £536. Always encouraging to see that we’ve covered our costs, albeit by a small amount, and at this point I’d like to express our huge thanks to CSK church for allowing Lighthouse to use their premises free of charge – this makes a huge difference to our expenditure and has allowed us to invest in equipment again this year.
Income - £10,446
Church donatons –We received continued generous support from CSK Church, Kings Church, New Life Christian Fellowship, St Mary and St George, Our Lady of Grace, and Oakridge Baptist. Total received from churches £4,440. When comparing to 2024 it needs to be remembered we received couple of special donations from the closing Avenue Methodist Church and a one-off donation from Venture Church.
Grant Funding – We didn’t apply this year for the Buckinghamshire Council Community grant as we don’t qualify due to having reserves adequate to cover our costs for a future year
Individual supporter donatons – again we have been so blessed by individuals who have supported us (and continue to support us) so generously with a total of £1,470.
Donatons through the week (including online)
Donations through the week were £2,945 (£1,200 of this through GoodHub Online).
Donations through the week showed just over a 20% increase on the previous year which is amazing. Thank you to our Chair for encouraging parents at the final mainstage to donate if they are able so that we can continue in future years.
Gif Aid
£883, three quarters of which related to our previous year claim. The claim has been prepared for the current year and amounts to just under £700.
Shop
The shop ran again this year, mostly selling t-shirts and caps; donated second hand books and games; and sweets. It had income of £588 and after deducting costs made a surplus of £267. A 50% increase on the surplus of the previous year.
The sales figure also includes £120 of income received for volunteer t-shirts.
Expenditure - £9,910
Site Costs (exc Equipment purchase/school parking hire/toilet hire) (£402)
Significantly lower than the previous year as no AV equipment was hired so this covered main stage costs and atrium decoration.
Toilet Hire (£480)
This was an increased cost this year as we hired 8 portaloos compared to 6 the previous year.
School Hire (£200)
The school hire fees this year were for parking only. The usage and benefit of this facility is to be analysed before re-hiring next year.
Equipment Purchase (£2468)
This includes the purchase of 4 more gazebos/shelters– one for sport; one for craft; one for the prayer space; and one for replacement of damaged parts/spares. There has been £500 paid from LHHW to cover some of these costs and this will show in next years accounts.
The equipment total also includes the cost for the purchase of the large tv used on main stage and the stand to go with it.
First Aid (£565)
No increase on last year (or the year before).
Insurance (£261)
Slightly lower cost this year partly due to the reduced value of the AV equipment hired in. Thanks go to Lighthouse Central for re-negotiating a good deal for us.
– Admin Costs (£2121) second largest cost
These costs include the admin fee charged by LHCentral of £5per head for each child and volunteer (325 @ £5= £1625) plus DBS costs £6/head (5 @ £6.00 = £30) – charged for numbers enrolled not necessarily the same as those who attend.
Volunteers 148/ children 177
(very similar figures to 2024 -Volunteers enrolled 143/children enrolled 169)
Also paid an annual subscription fee to LHCentral of £325
Database contribution of £113
Stationery costs of £28
Bank Charges (£69)
HSBC have now dropped their monthly charge of £5 fee per month for managing charity accounts although they still charge activity fees of 40p per cheque/40p per £100 cash.
Actvites (£1106)
Include costs for the Pirate’s challenge maths workshop of £780. Craft £69. Age groups £257
Shop costs (£321)
Tshirts and sweets. Books and toys were donated
T shirts/badges (£954)
This is a significant increase from last year. Double the quantity of lanyards ordered and more than double the number of red t-shirts. Plus we had the cost of the yellow t-shirts for the 11’s.
Refreshments (£892)
This includes the BBQ – a very reasonable £430 – which we had to practically force him to invoice for; and it also covers refreshments during the week. Lots of biscuits purchased!
Charitable Donatons
No donation given to other charities.
Gifs £71
Books given out “It’s Your Move”.
Reserves - £11073
Our reserves are very healthy and as we look ahead to Lighthouse 2026 they are adequate to cover any costs that are incurred before next year’s LH week.
So another successful year – more importantly for the children, their families and the volunteers – but needing to be backed up by secure finances. All thanks to God for His abundant provision in supplying all that we need for His Kingdom works.
Jacqui Griggs
Treasurer and Trustee
Lighthouse Cressex
24[th] November 2025
RECEIPTS AND PAYMENTS ACCOUNTS
LIGHTHOUSE CRESSEX
CIO NUMBER 1183476
FOR THE FINANCIAL YEAR ENDED 30TH SEPTEMBER 2025
| RECEIPTS Donations (Churches, Grants, Supporters) Donations (during the week) Donations (online) Gift aid tax refund Sales Total PAYMENTS Site - Set Up/Stage/AV Hire of car park Hire of toilets Eqpt Purchase - Gazebos/TV Screen First Aid Insurance Admin Bank charges Activities Shop Helpers T-shirts/lanyards/badges Refreshments Gifts for LH children/families Misc Total Income less expenditure for current year Balance bought forward from previous year Balance carried forward to following year |
2025 5910 1745 1200 883 708 £10 446 402 200 480 2468 565 261 2121 69 1106 321 954 892 71 £9 910 £536 £10 537 £11 073 |
2025 5910 1745 1200 883 708 £10 446 |
|---|---|---|
| 402 200 480 2468 565 261 2121 69 1106 321 954 892 71 £9 910 |
| BALANCE SHEET AS AT 30TH SEPTEMBER 2025 | BALANCE SHEET AS AT 30TH SEPTEMBER 2025 |
|---|---|
| Current Assets/Liabilities: | |
| Cash in hand at bank | £14 758 |
| Less unpresented cheques | £3 685 |
| Total | £11 073 |