Caroline Downey

Caroline Downey, the supreme champion of Irish charity fundraisers, is sitting in her more than comfortable sitting room in her rather lovely (and pleasingly un-bling) house in Killiney, looking out at the view of the bay. It's the week before the 12th annual Childline concert and the originator and hands-on producer of the show is remarkably calm, considering that she has spend the last number of months putting together a bill that includes Westlife's first performance in 18 months, Alexandra Burke, JLS, The Saturdays and a host of other artists that might be expected to flex a little ego when it comes to sharing the limelight.

"Believe me," she says, "after the three supermodel shows we put on a few years back, this is a piece of cake."

No tantrums then? Apparently not. Everyone working on the show, from the performers to the staff of the O2, gives their services for free. There is no charge for the venue or for equipment, the record companies pay for the flights and what hard costs there are (hotels and extra lighting that has to be brought in from outside the country, primarily) are covered by sponsorship from Cheerios. Even the food and drink backstage is free, thanks to Dunnes Stores, Wrights of Howth, Coca Cola and others.

"It means," says Downey, "that when a kid gives me €45 for their ticket, €45 is what I'm able to pass on to Childline."

This year, tickets sold out in 28 minutes – the fastest yet. The flagship concert raises €400,000 annually and the television broadcast means that the show reaches hundreds of thousands of children.

"As a charity we couldn't buy the goodwill and the publicity that goes with it," Downey tells me. "We get the message across. The association with Childline of all the acts that perform has had an enormous impact in terms of reducing the stigma associated with child sexual abuse. Last year, when Nicky Byrne started calling out the phone number from stage, the audience drowned him out to finish it. It was an amazing moment."

This year, a special tribute to Stephen Gately, who appeared in the show on many occasions as both presenter and performer, is planned. There will not be a dry eye in the house.

The Childline service costs €4m a year to run, for which the ISPCC receives no government support. It receives an average of 66,500 calls a month. Early sexualisation and mental health are currently the most common issues raised by callers.

"Abuse increases because of money pressure," Caroline confirms. "And calls double at Christmas. Kids have this idea of the magic Christmas and when it comes Mummy is still drunk and Daddy is still beating her and there's no food on the table and nothing magical at all has happened."

Born in Dublin, Caroline Downey's childhood was nomadic. The eldest of five children, she left Ireland at the age of four, moving first to Australia, then to South Africa and then back to Ireland.

"I'm not really sure why we moved around so much. I think my mother, with three young children at that stage, just wanted to travel. My father was a fencing contractor and in the '60s they used to pay for skilled workers to move to Australia so they decided to go. And I had an uncle in South Africa so that's why we headed there. I loved everywhere that we lived, although in Durban I was very aware of the heavy apartheid."

Downey attended eight different schools in total, none of them in Ireland. Small wonder that, arriving back in Dublin at the age of 16, she had had enough.

"I just couldn't start from scratch again, with a new school and new people, with different history and different geography and different languages. I hated school. It turned out that I have a mild form of dyslexia that made spelling and some other things more difficult… so although I have a huge love for history and literature I was never very academic."

How did she adjust to life in Dublin, never having lived here for more than a few months since the age of four?

"The weather the only downside, although back then we did have summers. I look back at photos and we all have tanned legs that weren't from going on holidays – they were from lying out in the back garden.

"I left home and moved into a flat in town and I got a job at Captain America's. There was a great buzz about the place, everyone worked there. Those were great times even though we were in the midst of a recession – if you wanted more money you just took on extra shifts.

"I took a part-time job in a nightclub and that's where I met Dennis [Desmond, of MCD]. We started living together when I was 19. He had just gone full-time, booking bands – his first big outdoor gig was U2 supporting Thin Lizzy at Slane in 1981. I used to work for him doing the door at the SFX and McGonagles. I started modelling around then too – first with Geraldine Brand and later with Elaine Doody. I was a size 12 so they used to send me down the country where the women were supposed to be bigger than in Dublin. I used to model for John Rocha and Michael Mortell; I never got booked for Richard Lewis because I wasn't flat-chested.

"The '80s were the best time of my life, although I think the fashion should be left there. We didn't have any children; we had new friends – people like Jean Crowley and Carol Dixon and Louis Walsh and May Frisby and Elaine Doody who are still the absolute core of our friends today. Dennis' business was starting out and there was an influx of musicians into Ireland – bands like Spandau Ballet and Frankie Goes to Hollywood based themselves here and the U2 boys were starting out. After gigs I used to round up every model and hairdresser in town and drag everyone down to the Pink Elephant..."

The couple's first child, Zach, was born in 1986 and they married a year later. "Dennis had asked me every day for six years to marry him and I had always said 'no'. I just didn't see the need for it. But once we had Zach it made sense."

Zach is now based in London, training with entertainment behemoth Live Nation. The couple's daughter, Storm, is 19, and studying in Galway. Jet (17) is in fifth year in school.

Downey first got involved with the ISPCC in the mid-'80s. "I started fundraising when Ann Lovett died. I could not comprehend how a girl who was 15 could have been pregnant and that no one knew. And that she gave birth in a graveyard, which must have been a very scary place to be, and that the baby died and she died and six months later her sister killed herself. It just didn't make any sense. We were at a dinner party talking about the case and Jane Hogan, who worked with the ISPCC, was there. Afterwards she called me and said that if I felt that strongly I should come and help with their ball. I've been with them ever since."

Downey now works as a full-time – "except for the summer and Easter, those are for the kids" – unpaid fundraiser for the ISPCC and The Christina Noble Foundation, and sits on the board of the Dublin Theatre Festival and the proposed Children's Museum, which is now stalled, she hopes temporarily. She also produces the annual Meteor awards.

Working from home, in a small office with a big view, she says she is like "Howard Hughes. I sit here all day in my pyjamas, and I don't get dressed until I absolutely have to. You should see the state of me."

She has a reputation for being a tough person to say 'no' to – "people cross the street when they see me coming and I smile sweetly and say 'I was only going to invite you round for dinner but if you want to give me money…'". In a changed economic climate she is cheerfully pragmatic.

"I fundraise for two charities that really need the money. People just can't comprehend the abuse of small children. So I don't have to sell it, they get it straight away. And because I don't get paid for what I do and am doing it for the right reasons it's not as difficult for me as it is for paid fundraisers. If people can't give, I understand, I don't take it personally – if someone turned me down flat when I know they have it then I would take it personally, but I haven't had to open the black book too many times yet…

"When people had money they were very generous, but I'm very conscious of not asking people to give what they haven't got. And we all – Deirdre [Kelly], Norma [Smurfit] and I – end up hitting the same people over and over again. It will come back in a few years, but in the meantime we have to keep our heads above water.

"We're charging people on the MCD guest lists now – it's a tenner for an O2 show, €20 for outdoor – and we've already made €60,000 in seven months. It's a simple concept and makes a massive difference. The Cheerios breakfast for Childline is another one of those events that raises a small amount of money from a large number of people."

Does she ever feel that she will burn out?

"Two years ago I thought that I was too tired, but then something happens, you go to South Africa [Caroline and Jet participated in last year's Niall Mellon building blitz] or you hear a story or see some pictures and you get a kick up the arse, because we have so much and they have so little. I keep pictures up of various events just to remind me, to keep me focused."

For the future, Downey is developing a movie project based on an Irish epic story which she hopes to shoot once Jet is finished school. "When the kids have all left home it'll be the time that I can take on something that allows me to be away from them. We spend our lives teaching them to be independent so it's really important for us as mothers not to be clingy."

In the meantime, it's back to finalising details of Brown Thomas' Christmas fundraising for ISPCC and Christina Noble – the proceeds from Santa and giftwrapping are being shared between the two. The work of a tireless charity fundraiser is never done.