Christmas lights couple ready to 'take the hit' on energy bills for Soham charity display

• Stuart Leithes takes a look around their winter wonderland display

A couple have turned on a huge Christmas lights display outside their house - saying they will "take the hit" on the huge energy bill to raise money for charity.

Helen and John Attlesey decorate their house in Soham, Cambridgeshire, every year to raise money for charities which supported their grandson, Jacob.

They began rigging their home with hundreds of the festive lights back in September and only finished around a week ago.

Despite the rising cost of electricity, the couple said they still felt they had to put on the incredible display.

"[The bills] will be dearer, the same as everybody else - we'll just have to take the hit really," Mrs Attlesey told ITV News Anglia.

"Our grandson [Jacob] had epilepsy when he was six and that was terminal," said her husband.

"Great Ormond Street carried out on operation and saved his life and Dreamflight helped him afterwards and that's why we do the lights for them, just for charity to raise money to help them."

He said the couple had been determined to carry on with the display, which involves hundreds of illuminated figures, animals, snowmen and Santas.

But Mrs Attlesey said the couple had not calculated how much more this year's display would add to their energy bill, at the end of a year in which prices have sky-rocketed.

"People said: 'Are you doing it this year?'

"We've got them, so we might as well use them, take the hit and that's it," she said.

"If we all packed up, no charity would get anything, would they? So we just do it to help others."

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