Food bank donations increase after bus break-in

The Key Community Bus was broken into on Sunday

A charity has said it has seen an increase in donations to its food bank after its bus was vandalised.

The Key Community Bus is a shop that travels around South Tyneside selling food at low prices while offering advice services on the upper deck.

On Sunday it was broken into and vandalised while parked at the Stagecoach depot in South Shields overnight, resulting in about £500 of damage.

But Jo Benham-Brown, business development and communities manager at Key, said people viewed it as an "attack on the community" and have since rallied round the charity.

The vandals opened food packets, some of which was left untouched but had to be destroyed anyway, and scrawled graffiti on noticeboards.

Staff and volunteers spent Monday cleaning up the bus

Ms Benham-Brown said it was "really disappointing" as it is obvious it is a charity vehicle.

"If they were just hungry, we do have a food bank, we would have fed them," she said.

Key also works with young people to offer support and try to prevent anti-social behaviour.

"We work to tackle that, which is why it's doubly insulting," Ms Benham-Brown said.

"We do interventions with teams specifically to try and avoid this sort of incident, so it's particularly galling to be the victim of it."

Since the break-in the charity has seen an increase in donations

On Monday there was a massive clean up effort to get the bus operational again by Tuesday morning, which Ms Benham-Brown attributed to the "hard work of staff and volunteers".

"I think it's been a little bit of an attack on our community," she said.

"I think a lot of people felt it personally and felt really, really kind of angry that such a great community asset could be targeted in that way.

"We have seen donations to our food bank increase and we've actually had a number of financial donations made to us directly online referencing the break-in.

"So it's really been quite heartwarming how many people have wanted to make it right."