Show restraint when shopping

I live in Ashington which, like many of our small villages, has its share of elderly and vulnerable people.

We have already received through the door three offers of help with shopping, prescriptions or anything else which is very comforting to know in case we need this support.

On the other hand the village has a real problem and this could make the offers of help difficult to fulfil.

We have on one main shop, the Co-op plus M&S at the petrol station.

The Co-op is designed to cater for the needs of the village and I believe could largely do so even at the moment - however the shop is being inundated by people who the staff have never seen before who are clearly coming from other areas because they cannot find supplies in other supermarkets.

As a result the shelves including all the basics are emptied within a few hours of deliveries arriving.

Some of this is plain hoarding - earlier this week a woman filled a trolley with £145 of goods took this out and five minutes later was back and purchased a further £125 worth. The shop had no legal right to refuse.

I have e-mailed the Co-op head office asking if an overall limit can be put on the number of items that can be purchased at one time in addition to restrictions on basic items such as milk, bread and eggs, so that their managers can reuse to sell in such bulk.

I appreciate that there will be people who are also buying for others but the shop staff will know these and exceptions can be made.

I await a response from the Co-op but wonder if you can highlight the issue with a plea to everyone to show restraint and consideration. In the light of this weeks events I am not at all confident that this will happen but we can at least try.