Patients, visitors and staff at Darent Valley Hospital have received a special Christmas message from Santa, thanks to the magical Laplander's own hospital representative.

Clinical systems manager Paul Seymour has worked at the hospital for more than 16 years and for the past decade has doubled up as the maternity department's official Santa, attending various hospital-wide events to bring some festive cheer.

And while this year has brought some restrictions to social events, Paul and his wife Joanne, who also works for the maternity department at Darent Valley Hospital, came up with the idea of creating a Santa message video to help keep the Christmas spirit alive.

"The idea behind the ‘message from Santa video’ was to try to make up in some small way for the fact that Santa would be unable to physically attend any of the events this year due to social distancing and tier restrictions," said Paul. "I had initially intended to write a message specifically for the maternity and paediatric staff but, of course, recognised that everyone had worked so hard and therefore decided to make the message more generic so as to include all hospital staff and their families."

While acknowledging the problems faced this Christmas, Paul wanted to make a positive and upbeat message – which he filmed, edited and produced on his iPad with the help of his wife, Santa’s chief Elf, and, of course, Father Christmas himself.

He even enlisted the help of a sign-language specialist, who was incorporated into the video.

Paul added: "Clearly this Christmas is going to be difficult and different for so many people and so I really do hope that Santa’s simple message can provide a little hope and cheer as we approach what we all hope is going to be a much much better year next year!"

Read more: all the latest news for Dartford