A GROUP of volunteers from Newport gave away hundreds of items of clothing as part of an ongoing campaign to help people in need in the city.

After the success of Help the Homeless Newport's community clothing giveaway on Sunday, the group welcomed Newport residents to their Commercial Road base again on Thursday.

The giveaway is part of the group’s ongoing efforts to move away from collecting clothing to help the homeless and to instead look at other ways to help people in need, such as help them find temporary accommodation, combatting food poverty or sharing contacts for advice or services.

Tariq Khan, from Help the Homeless Newport, said: “We had two clothing collections throughout last year and in November we had Wrap-Up Newport, where we asked for people to donate coats for the winter.

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“We had individuals, businesses and organisations from across the city getting involved. In total, 959 coats were donated.

“These were split up and distributed between three local charities. After that, we had some surplus stock, so we decided to hold this community giveaway on Sunday.

“It meant the community could come into the shop and we could talk to them about what we do.

“It was not just for the homeless community either, but for people who vulnerable, refugees or low-income families.

“We still had quite a bit of clothing left over so held another giveaway on Thursday.

“As well as giving out clothing, we had one lady who made an extremely generous donation to our foodbank. She even stayed to help put together some food parcels, and we gave out three or four of them.

“It has been a good day overall. There is obviously a need for the services we were offering.

“It’s not about numbers for us, it’s more about sitting down with service users and speaking about what help they need most and help organising that.

“It’s about the little things – such as helping with organising doctors’ appointments, looking for accommodation and building up their self-confidence.”