A Ludlow charity will temporarily suspend all donation collections as it struggles to cope with the amount of rubbish left on its doorstep.

The Furniture Scheme restores and resells unwanted furniture to help excluded members of the community.

The charity will suspended collections as staff are struggling to cope with the amount of rubbish that has been left at their door rather than taken to the tip.

All collections through July, expect those already booked in, will be suspended. Once resumed, the free collection service they will only collect items that can be reused or repaired.

Chief executive Jean Jarvis MBE said: “We’ve always been so grateful to the local public for their donations of unwanted household items which we use to help people in need.

“We’ve been struggling to keep up with the increase of uncontrolled deliveries to our premises but we’ve reached breaking point and this is a cry for help."

According to Jean, the problem began when civic amenity site in Coder Road closed in 2014. Since then the team have witnessed an increase in the number of items being left outside the building, either out of hours or when the team are dealing with customers.

She added: “Over the last few month this has increased out of all proportion and people are dumping trailer and van loads of household items that cannot be recycled repaired or reused.

“Staff and volunteers are now spending a lot of time sorting and processing what they can and driving the rest to the waste centre at Craven Arms.

“There is a huge cost and time implication to this, besides the stressful conditions that staff and volunteers are now under as they try to deal with this alongside their normal roles.”

Shropshire Councillor Vivienne Parry, for Ludlow South, supports the charity.

She said: “The Furniture Scheme does some wonderful work in Ludlow and the people of this town are at the heart of what they do. It is a shame some people feel they can treat the site as a dumping ground, this greatly hampers the work they do.

"I would call upon these people to use the designated recycling centre in Craven Arms and think before they either donate items or leave items outside the charity. I do appreciate that sometimes people do not have the money or the transport to dispose of it properly and I am going to talk to the council and see if they can put a skip out occasionally and try to get the leader of the Council Peter Nutting to come down to Ludlow and see the problem.

She added: “It is terrible the way Shropshire Council has dumped everything in people’s laps.”

Anyone who would like to volunteer or find out more information about The Furniture Scheme, should call 01584 874922, email info@furniturescheme.co.uk or visit http://www.furniturescheme.co.uk.