SIR, Through your paper’s columns I would like to thank your readers for their generous response to the food bank box in the Co-op here in Innerleithen.

I would also like to thank the Co-op and all their workers for their support for this project. Useful donations at this time of year not only included the usual dried and tinned foods but also children’s toys as well as hygiene products and other domestic products.

All this will help make up for the government attacks on welfare benefits for low income groups working as well as those without jobs. The children of the poorest are being made to pay for the rich speculators who provoked this crisis in the first place. Our governments are imposing years of austerity and cuts aimed especially at women who work for and use our public services.

I hope that after the festive season there will still be generous support for this growing project as there is no indication of any other relief during 2015. I think it is a good sign that this activity has been about more than the referendum but social justice too.

The Peeblesshire Foodbank office can be contacted on 07799041723 or email: info@peeblesshire.foodbank.org.uk I am, etc.

Norman Lockhart Waverley Road Innerleithen