IT has been five years since staff at Boots in Taunton donated more than 30 bags to Arc in a bid to help homeless people over the festive season.

The team handed over the bags to Rosie Hather, who was the fundraising officer for Arc, on Friday, December 21, 2018 after seeing homeless people on the town’s streets.

Arc is the trading name for Taunton Association for the Homeless.

Speaking at the time, Sandy Blackmore, assistant manager at Boots in Taunton, said: “We were talking to each other at work about the amount of people living on the streets in Taunton and knew that we wanted to do something.

“This is not something we have done before and we have given this some real thought.

“We thought that bags could be really useful for homeless people to store their belongings in so we decided to get them together and donate them.

“We have donated around 30 bags to Arc and we hope the bags will help homeless people in Taunton this winter.”

Speaking in 2018, Rosie Hather added: “It is an amazing help for Boots to donate these bags.

“These bags will be good for our clients who are moving into accommodation or moving out as it will give them a place to store their belongings.

“So a big thank you to Boots.”

The team had also been collecting funds to make a donation to Arc before the start of 2019.