MILLIONAIRES they may be – but Ian and Kim McCarthy have promised that money won’t change them.
The Washington couple have vowed to retain their jobs – Ian, 48, works at Nissan, while Kim, 50, is a supervisor at Gala Bingo in the Galleries Retail Park – instead of spending their money on a lavish lifestyle.
They scooped £1million on the Euromillions Millionaire Raffle draw on Christmas Day.
“We love where we live and have always lived in Washington, our main focus is our family and our two sons,” said Ian who lives with Kim in Fatfield.
Kim said: “We’re just going to stick to the normal routine. I was collecting cups at the bingo after the win and everyone was saying ‘why are you doing that, you’re a millionaire.’
“We’ll take each day as it comes. We love our jobs, we’re not packing them in.”
Ian, who is dad to Anthony, 26, and Jonathon, 20, said: “Just because we’ve got a million pounds we don’t want to change and we don’t want people around us to change either.”
Ian, who works at Nissan’s axle plant, has played The National Lottery since it started and, aside from the odd £10 prize, has never won a major amount.
He bought his winning EuroMillions ticket from Fatfield newsagents and the number drawn was DWX602077 in the special draw on Christmas Day that guaranteed to create 25 millionaires.
The dad-of-two found out he had won last week when he took a break from doing some DIY to check his numbers on his son’s computer.
“I don’t even normally check my numbers at home. I usually leave it for a few weeks and then take all my tickets to check at the newsagents in one go, but this time I checked myself,” he said.
“I couldn’t believe it and neither could Jonathon so we went to see Anthony who lives nearby and got him to double check.
“The look on their faces was a picture – they both work with me at Nissan and the thought that we’d potentially won a life-changing amount of money was overwhelming.
“It felt surreal.”
Though the couple, who have been married for 21 years, are planning to be careful with the money they do hope to use it to take their first holiday abroad.
“We got our first ever passports last year,” said Kim. “Because we were planning to go abroad anyway. The money will help us to things we had already planned.”
Ian added: “Our son is 21 this year so we hope to give him a great 21st birthday party and to help our eldest son out too.”
Twitter: @sunechokaty
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