(Brighton, UK) As part of his ongoing campaign, Mr Gay Europe, Matt Rood, calls on the LGBTQ+ community to help raise awareness of fostering and adoption by hosting local events in support of Pride Families.
Matt established Pride Families for the following:
- To raise awareness that the LGBTQ+ community can provide safe, loving and nurturing homes to children in need
- To provide education in schools about diversity and acceptance of “different” families
- To create a support network and both social and charity events for adopters and carers within the community
With a child being taken into the care system every 20 minutes in the UK alone, there is currently a need for over 9000 foster carers. There are very few same-sex couples who volunteering to foster, but if only 2 percent of the LGBTQ+ community became carers, this alarming statistic would change dramatically.
– Fostering takes a lot of courage and strength, but the rewards are tremendous, and watching a child thrive and return to a stronger family unit is incredible, Matt Rood says.
Matt so strongly believes in providing opportunities for these children that, in addition to providing care for ten children over three years with his former partner, Pride Families became the platform pledge for his winning bids both for Mr Gay England in May 2017, and again for Mr Gay Europe in August 2017.
Since winning, Matt has not only met with MP Emma Lewell-Buck at Parliament, he travelled to Oslo to speak with deputy leader of the Norwegian Labour Party Haida Tajik and leader of the party’s LGBT network Jon Reidar Øyan.
Matt and Pride Families have hosted activity weekends to encourage a sense of belonging and integration into the local community, to share stories and experiences, to make friends with other blended families, and to help support and advise one another with the challenging issues that come along with fostering and adoption. But most of all, to have fun! Now he wants existing LGBTQ+ families and carers to host their own local events to help spread the word.
Charitable organisations
Two important charities in this area that Matt has worked with and supports are:
New Family Social – the UK network for LGBT adoptive and foster families.
Coram – An adoption charity who finds adoptive families for children in need of loving, permanent homes, and who help traumatised children express their pain through art and music, and who provide homeless outreach to young people.
More about Matt
When not campaigning for Mr Gay Europe and Pride Families, Matt runs a successful Brighton-based dog training and walking company, RoodDog. Matt is also a fitness model and TV presenter, having starred in Channel Watch’s reality series The Dog Hotel. Matt loves living in a community like Brighton, and feels it’s given him the opportunity to be exactly who he wants to be.
– It’s vibrant, colourful, accepting – like no other city. I can’t imagine living anywhere else, Matt says.
Inspired?
Would you like to support Matt and his cause and campaign? Or are you inspired and would like to do the same in your local community? Take the first step, reach out to Matt and he will for sure appreciate your support and might have some advice on how you can go about to contribute.
If you want to contact Matt, please use this contact form
- pridefamilies
- mrgayeurope
- @pridefamilies
- @mrgayeurope_mattrood
- @mrgayeurope
Matt’s contact details:
+44 (0) 7885 903 509
matthr80@gmail.com
Facebook: pridefamilies
Instagram: @pridefamilies, @mrgayeurope_mattrood
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