Pensioner raises almost £15,000 for Great North Air Ambulance Service through clothing collections

Peter Harris began organising collections in early 2020 after one of his neighbours died, and it was decided her clothes were going to be donated to support Great North Air Ambulance Service (GNAAS).

But once the pandemic started it was deemed unsafe for the collection team to carry out their work they were briefly furloughed.

During this time, the team volunteered to help deliver vital PPE to hospitals, before restarting clothing collections in May 2020, but only responding to pre-arranged collections.

The 71-year-old said: “I offered to store the clothes in my shed and GNAAS could collect them from mine when they were back doing collections. It started off with one-off collections being done, and we got given the bags to fill up with clothing and other items and the team came to collect them.

“They mentioned they were looking for people to be community collection points and I’m retired so I have time to do it, so my details were passed onto the team and a week or so later, they got in touch and sent me a pack with the information I needed including a poster I could use promoting what they collect and the bags.

“I shared the poster on our local community Facebook page and said that people can bring stuff to me. It started off with about 20-40 bags and it’s just grown from there.”

Peter believes he’s raised approximately £15,000 for charity through his collections and is a big supporter of the charity and the work they do.”

He added: “I enjoy doing the collections and I get pleasure out of knowing my work is supporting a charity, so I would definitely encourage other people to get involved and host their own collections.”

To arrange a clothing collection on behalf of GNAAS, please contact the charity’s collections team on 01325 308 139 or fill in the contact form via the website.

For those who live in Murton, the drop off point for donations is by Peter’s shed door at 27 Penryn Avenue, Murton, Seaham SR7 9LL.