Double Lotto win for deserving Blenheim couple

An elderly Blenheim couple have won two lotteries in two years.

And the prizes, a $520,000 house and $13,884 second division Lotto, could not have gone to a more deserving duo.

Graeme and Irene Percy have fostered almost 100 children, donate 10 per cent of their income to charities every year and regularly volunteer.

Graeme Percy, 70, said they would donate 20 per cent of their latest win to charities or people who needed it. Like an elderly woman they know who can't afford a cellphone. The rest would go to their seven grandchildren he said.

Percy said their first win brought mixed emotions as it came two weeks after their son committed suicide in June, 2015. They had won a fully furnished house in Taupo through the Heart Foundation Lottery.

But it was too hard getting out of Blenheim airport to go to Taupo with their seven grandchildren so they sold it and bought a beach house in Stoke, just out of Nelson.

For the second win Percy bought two $6 lucky dips at the supermarket last week for his wife's 66th birthday, one for her, one for him.

"I fell over backwards when she said she had won $13,884.

"But it would have been nice if someone who needed it more than us had won it. Sharing is caring. There are a lot of people out there who are desperate at the moment.

"We don't believe that possessions are an important part of our life."

The couple have donated 10 per cent of their income to charity or to help people every year, and it's not to do with religion, Percy said. The Red Cross is one they give to regularly.

The Percys help when they can and it's always worth it, he said. Last winter he paid for an elderly woman's groceries at the checkout as he knew she was struggling.

"She turned around and gave me a big hug and said 'I can keep warm for months now' with the money she saved."

The Percys have been married for 43 years and have been foster parents for just as long. The same week they came back from their honeymoon they jumped in to foster six children after the father got electrocuted.

"That's where it started.

"Some we only had three or four nights. Troublesome teenagers have been our forte. We haven't met a bad teen yet, but we've met some pretty bad parents."

Percy, who spends his time volunteering for community patrol and the monthly street clean, gets his satisfaction from hearing about one of their children doing well.

- NZ Herald