Careworker down to her last £20 buys £1m scratchcard

Hard-working careworker, Jackie Murphy, was on her way home from a 12 hour shift. The 61-year-old from Shrewsbury in Shropshire was down to her last £20, but decided to risk £5 of it on a Lucky 777 scratchcard. She played the card and was stunned to discover that she'd won the £1 million jackpot.

She told the Daily Mail that as she earns the minimum wage, it takes an hour to earn enough to buy a scratchcard, so she doesn't usually play them: she just decided to on a whim when she was in the shop picking up a bottle of milk.

She is set to marry fiancé John Potter, a scaffolder, next month, but told the Express and Star that the win won't change the day much - the bridesmaids will still walk down the aisle in Matalan dresses, and she'll still wear shoes from Tesco. The only changes to their plans are that they'll have flowers and balloons now - and offer a free bar to their guests. They will be able to afford a honeymoon too.

Taking care
This isn't the first time a careworker has picked up a major jackpot. In fact Camelot said in 2012 that they were one of the three luckiest professions when it came to winning big on the lottery - along with builders and administrators. The unluckiest professions, meanwhile, were estate agents, advertisers and market traders.

One of the striking things about winners in this profession is that many of them continue to work. In November last year Ron Elliot, another careworker, won £8 million on the lottery and said he had no plans to retire - as his patients needed him.

Then there were the nine careworkers at one home in Upminster, who shared a payout of £7 million in 2008. They pledged to carry on working at the home, saying they wanted to share their good fortune with the residents and not abandon them.

However, there are exceptions to the rule. In one odd case in 2002, a careworker from Winnipeg in Canada sued the elderly woman she looked after, trying to get a share of a multi-million lottery win. The careworker had bought the ticket for her elderly client, and said the pair had a verbal agreement to share any winnings. The ticket picked up a $7.2 million jackpot - at which point the elderly woman forgot all about their agreement. The carer took her to court but lost as she couldn't prove they had any arrangement at all.

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