Scouts honour bushfire victims

WHEN Peta Lanham made a simple phone call last week scouting for donations to send to Victorian bushfire victims, she could not have expected the generous outcome.

Donations of everything from clothing to white goods, pet food to furniture literally packs the rafters of the Redbank Plains Scout Hut, a 12 metre shipping container and an old shed.

So enormous has been the level of donations, a rough plan has been chalked on the blackboard displaying where everything has been placed.

Tarps were also put up outside the hut, so scouts could go about their activities, because there was no room inside.

Mrs Lanham said donations had been received from Esk (which filled a six metre container), Lowood, Fernvale and across Ipswich and Brisbane.

“A lady has driven down from Noosa and emptied out her unit at New Farm to donate,” Mrs Lanham said.

“I thought we would get three to four boxes.”

The scout leader said the level of support for the appeal had been “overwhelming”.

“We have had people purchase things to donate,” Mrs Lanham said.

“We've also had kids come down with toys.

“We had a little boy come in with his teddy and he said 'it is my teddy, but other kids need it'.”

The group even received an offer of a 1982 Mercedes.

“We have had offers of cars and they are the only we have turned down,” Mrs Lanham said.

“We just don't have room. We're already taking a B-double.”

Volunteers will drive the goods down to Victoria next Wednesday.

Once there, items will be taken to a Salvation Army warehouse in Clayton, a suburb of Melbourne, to be sorted and distributed.