Islington Tribune - News: Thieves grab charity bags from doorsteps

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Islington Tribune - by PETER GRUNER
Published: 25 May 2007

Lib Dem Bridget Fox, left, and MP Jo Swinson with Clothes Aid workers

Thieves grab charity bags from doorsteps

Bike patrols on streets as clothes donations go missing

A CHARITY war has broken out in Islington, with bags of donated clothes disappearing from outside homes before they can be collected.
Competition has become so fierce that Essex Road-based Clothes Aid has employed a team of motorcyclists to help prevent clothing donations being taken by other groups, some of which are believed to be selling them for profit.
Clothes Aid, the licensed collection agent for Great Ormond Street Hospital in Bloomsbury, said it had noticed over the last 18 months an increase in “unscrupulous” operators, who target homes with “misleading” fliers and collection bags.
The leaflets ask residents to donate clothing and shoes for destinations “in the Third World”.
But, according to Clothes Aid, these organisations are not always authorised and it is believed many of these collectors may be selling the clothes for profit.
Evidence obtained by Clothes Aid indicates bags left out for the charity are being stolen to order.
Michael Lomotey, its head of collection protection, said: “We’ve been working in partnership with Great Ormond Street and the police to tackle these thefts and have had 80 arrests to date.”
He added that two motorcyclists, who are “highly trained” at surveillance and monitoring, are keeping an eye on bags left in certain areas.
Bridget Fox, Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate for Islington South and Finsbury, has also called for further action to stamp out the bag snatchers. Jo Swinson, Lib Dem MP for East Dunbartonshire, raised the issue of bogus collectors in a debate in Parliament when she called for stronger Trading Standards regulation to outlaw misleading leaflets.

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