A group of volunteers from Ledbury have finished collecting donations for Ukraine - for now.

The group have been packing up and sorting items at the Market House for the past few weeks, but the building now needs to be used for other purposes.

Lara Sysum helped get the group together and has also been accepting donations at the shop she runs in The Homend, Pacific Dove Clothing.

She said hundreds of boxes had been packed and multiple trips made to Hereford and Gloucester to deliver the items to donation centres.

“A massive thank you to everyone who donated, to the businesses that arranged large collections, and to the other community groups that dived in to help,” Lara said on Facebook.

“But my biggest thank you is to everyone that volunteered their time to get this group going, running and continuing to function so beautifully.

“We have finished collecting for now, but that’s not to say the group will not collect again or head in different directions (where needed) for the future to help those in need coming to the UK.”

'The war is not over'

She said to keep an eye on the Facebook group Ledbury Ukraine Aid for updates.

Julia Kravchenko, who also helped to organise the appeal, told the Ledbury Reporter earlier this month: “The council have been very kind to lend us the Market House for a month now but they need to use the building for other events and for their meetings. We can’t really push it any further.”

She said volunteers cannot keep packing and sorting items indefinitely, adding that the volume of donations wasn’t quite as big as it was at the beginning.

“But the war is not over by a long way, unfortunately, and people still need things. So where we can we will still take donated items to Hereford and Gloucester.

“And when people start arriving in Herefordshire, they will also need things. We will consider appealing for those items when the time comes.

“I’m so grateful to everyone who donated and helped our Ukrainian appeal. The support has been unbelievable from the council, local organisations and the Ledbury community.”