Charity wants sensible donations after being sent a mile of garden hose

Fresh Start homeless charity, Pic Greg Macvean TSPL

Fresh Start help previously homeless people to settle in their new homes by supplying them with useful household items.

However, they have been inundated with a string of mysterious packages containing garden hoses - despite the fact that none of the people they help are housed in properties with gardens.

The parcels containing the hoses have been coming in every other day over the past two weeks in Amazon deliveries, and now total 101.

At 15 metres each they add up to a total length of about a mile.

Therefore while they are grateful for the help, the charity has no use for them and would much rather be sent handy household goods.

Managing director Keith Robertson said: “We’ve been getting them every couple of days. It has got my caretaker going mad which tickles me, but we’ve not quite got to the bottom of why we are getting these hoses.

“If they have been sent by a donor then it’s really generous and we are grateful for that but it’s things for setting up a home we need.

“The items we would like to appeal for are cleaning products – toilet rolls, washing up liquid, yellow dusters etc, kitchen utensils wooden spoons, ladles, fish slice , pots and pans, clean pillows , small electrics such as kettle, toaster, iron and lamps.”

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The charity’s aim is to provide support when homeless people move into a new home in order to ease the transition and get them established into their new home.

They provide ‘starter packs’ which contain the basic items required to integrate back into the community, and also offer training and cooking classes.

Keith added: “We support 1500 households a year and it is empty shells they are moving into so we move people on in their houses with starter packs.

“Demand for goods is ongoing so we stop people going into debt trying to fill up their homes. If we can get a donor base built up we can get more people into homes.

“And if donors want to send stuff in using Amazon then that is absolutely great.”

In 2016, Shelter Scotland revealed some of the bizarre items they had been donated, including a full dominatrix set, a china doll with a lock of human hair glued under its clothes, a mummified cat, loose teeth with the roots still attached and 40 life-sized plastic pigeons.

A full bag of dirty underwear – around 30 pairs - was donated in Glasgow while a caravan was donated to a store in Dundee.

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