A CHARITY that helps provide school uniforms for Blackburn’s most desperate families is now targeting soup kitchens in the town.

Mum’s The Word (MTW), a Community Interest Company which offers low-cost, quality, new and ‘rewear’ used clothes, opened a new outlet at Blackburn Foodbank on Oakenhurst Road yesterday.

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The move comes as more and more families are struggling to meet their basic needs – with fears growing that Blackburn will be one of the places hardest hit when Chancellor George Osbourne’s welfare cuts start to bite.

Blackburn with Darwen Council has the second highest number of households receiving child and working tax credits in the country – after Newham in east London – with 7,600 households, 13.3 per cent of the area’s total, receiving one or both benefits.

Caroline Fotios – who helped found MTW in October 2010 with collection baskets (Drop Spots) in schools, organisations and community buildings – says the new initiative is needed as parents are struggling to find the money for the start of the autumn term.

She said: “We are providing new school uniforms for a number of schools within the borough and we are running an outlet from Darwen market three days a week selling new and used school uniforms.

“Our latest collaboration is with Blackburn Foodbank; we now run a weekly shop from their site on Oakenhurst Road once a week to meet the needs of our most vulnerable families.”

The Oaks Blackburn Foodbank service will be open every Tuesday from 9.30am-1pm over the summer holidays and there is a stall on Darwen Market that is open on Mondays, Fridays and Saturdays from 9am to 5pm.