THANKS have been given to a dedicated Holsworthy fundraiser who has help to raise a five-figure sum for local charities.

Andrew Braunton, a heavy goods vehicle driver for Stacey’s, has raised approximately £10,000 for his community through his efforts to bring festive cheer every December - in a true Father Christmas style.

While delivering for his employer, Mr Braunton dons his very best Father Christmas attire to bring cheer to all the places he visits, with an additional collecting tin accompanying him in order to raise much needed funds for his charity fundraising.

With a well deserved retirement looming in the coming months, meaning that the most recent Christmas will be his last raising money while working, the recipients of Mr Braunton’s final festive fundraiser were Holsworthy Rural Community Transport.

Holsworthy Rural Community Transport are a charity that offer door-to-door service for people who have no transport of their own to enable them to get out and about or to appointments.

The local charity operate a variety of services to help connect people in a rural community such as cars for care, minibus hires, as well ring-and-ride service, which provides a bookable door to door minibus service in which they collect people from their home and later return them to their home.

The other services operated by Holsworthy Rural Community Transport are ‘Cars for Care’, which is a service where people are picked up by volunteers in their own car to take them to appointments in addition to offering a minibus hire service utilising their 15 seater minibus which can be hired on weekends and evenings.

Mr Braunton’s final fundraiser raised £600 for the community transport charity, with a spokesperson for Holsworthy Community Rural Transport stating that the funds raised will go directly towards their running costs.

Dr Julia Foster, the fundraising and community development officer at Holsworthy Rural Community Transport, hailed the donation from Mr Braunton, stating that they were ‘absolutely delighted’ to have been the recipients of his efforts.

She said: “Holsworthy Rural Community Transport is absolutely delighted to have been the lucky recipient of Andrew Braunton’s charity fundraising this year.

Every Christmas, Andrew dons his fabulous Father Christmas attire and spreads festive cheer whilst collecting money for charity when making deliveries for Stacey’s in his lorry.

“This year, Andrew selected Holsworthy Rural Community Transport as his chosen charity and his collection raised an amazing £600 which he has donated and which will be used directly towards the running costs of the community transport services. We are extremely grateful for this very generous donation.

“In fact this will be the last year which Andrew does this since he is due to retire in May. Andrew has done this every Christmas for many years over which time he has raised a staggering £10,000 for a variety of deserving charities.

“Thank you Andrew for everything that you have done and best wishes for a very happy retirement.”