A bereft widow has donated gifts in excess of £12,000 to a Benfleet organisation, in a bid to help the ill and disabled.

The Castle Point Social Car Care Scheme, at the Tyrells Centre in Seamore Avenue, are delighted with their new manual wheelchair and electric wheelchair, which are already in use at the centre.

Jim Grant, transport manager of the Car Care Scheme, said: "We are thrilled with the equipment and very grateful. The electric wheelchair is fully equipped and it is a wonderful piece of machinery. It works really well."

The centre received the gifts when a woman read an appeal in the Echo asking for second-hand or no longer used wheelchairs for the Tyrells Campaign.

Mr Grant added: "The lady's husband died a few months ago through his illness and was confined to a wheelchair."

However, the centre was not expecting the woman, who does not want to be named, to also donate a Citroen Belingo people carrier.

Published Thursday December 20, 2001