Drunks cost charity shops cash

9:13am Monday 12th May 2008

Comments (1)   Have your say »

By Alex Love »

CHARITY shops across Cirencester are being forced out of money by senseless drunks.

Well meaning members of the public leave items outside the shops at weekends when the shops are closed, with drunkards frequently ripping open bags, scattering the contents everywhere and often urinating and vomitting on them.

This means shops have to spend funds that would normally go to charity on waste disposal.

It was especially bad over the May bank holiday weekend, with the Salvation Army shop on Dyer Street suffering in particular.

Staff arrived at the shop on Tuesday morning to find a mass of bin-bags stacked up outside their back door.

They had been torn open and the contents scattered all over the floor and urinated on.

Claire Trinder, manager of the shop, told the Standard: "We're a charity but we're being used as a dump at the moment."

"Those SITA bags are nearly £2 each, the most I've ever had to put out there is 35 bags. So that's £70 of rubbish a week - that is ridiculous. And it's not recycling, it's going straight to landfill - and that's my other concern."

"It is an increasing problem, if we can just appeal to the public not to do it."

Scott Moorson, manager of the Sue Ryder furniture shop in Brewery Car Park, is faced with a similar problem.

It is common for him to pay £50 a week in charity money for useless items to be disposed of.

Over the recent bank holiday weekend, ten boxes had been left outside his shop. They had been all been raided and damaged, rendering all the items inside useless.

"There's been vast increase in the past six or seven weeks of unsellable items," he said. "It's a growing problem."

Additionally, The Red Cross shop on Cricklade Street has also experienced items being abused on a regular basis.

Sue Waters, assistant manager, said: "They're depriving people in need." She added: "We don't want to put people off leaving stuff."

Peter Williams, a volunteer at the shop, said: "I think they're mindless idiots, if there's anything around they're just going to have a go."