Kind-hearted students and staff at Nelson and Colne College have delivered 104 festive hampers to the Colne Open Door Centre.

For the seventh consecutive year, a team of Care students at NCC has pulled together to help make hampers for the centre – a charity whose primary aim is to assist the poor and marginalised people living in the Pendle area.

Once again, the group has managed to better last year’s effort and as well as donating food, the NCC fund-raisers also filled boxes full of toys, books, games and toiletries, to ensure that families who may not have had much to celebrate are able to have a festive season to remember.

 Level 1 Care tutor Sue Hartley said: “A massive thank you to everyone who contributed to the Open Door Hamper Appeal this year.

“We managed to make an astonishing 104 hampers, some of which were for families and others for couples and individuals.

“This beats our total from last year of 64 large hampers, which is an incredible achievement. The donation of food, gifts and money from staff and students was overwhelming!

“I can assure you that the hampers we made will be distributed by Open Door to the people most in need in our local community. The support that has been given from both Seabrook crisps and Farmhouse biscuits has also been invaluable and is very much appreciated.

“The Entry 3 and Level 1 Care Students worked their socks off to collect the food and produce and deliver the hampers, many thanks to them, and to all the other students who kindly donated sweets, gifts and wrapped boxes and carried hampers to the van ready to be delivered.”

Dawn Lange, manager at Colne Open Door centre, said: “This is amazing! I cannot thank you all enough as this is needed more than ever at this time of year.

“People are struggling to buy even the basic essentials, so these treats will be a welcome surprise.”

For more information about Nelson and Colne College contact 01282 440272 or visit www.nelson.ac.uk