Toowoomba charity Lifeline Darling Downs targeted as vandals, thieves raid donation bins across region

“Opportunistic” thieves and vandals have broken into several bins across Toowoomba, in a series of acts that will cost Lifeline Darling Downs thousands of dollars in repairs and lost revenue.

Derek Tuffield, Lifeline. Vandals have been targeting Lifeline collection bins with several being broken into and the contents stolen.

The CEO of Lifeline Darling Downs has slammed “opportunistic” vandals and thieves who damaged and stole from several donation bins across the region, causing about $7000 in repairs and lost revenue in the process.

In a cruel end to a difficult year for the community sector, Lifeline will now have to fix six drop-off bins that were vandalised and trashed over the past 10 days.

CEO Derek Tuffield said the attacks were likely co-ordinated by the same group of people.

“We’ve had at least six clothing bins that have damaged, and not only have we lost the stock we now have to repair them so it’s yet another cost to us,” he said.

Derek Tuffield, Lifeline. Vandals have been targeting Lifeline collection bins with several being broken into and the contents stolen. Derek in among bins that need to be restored including several that have been damaged in recent break-ins.

“In some cases, they’ve cut the padlocks off, even if we’ve had the covers over them.

“They’ve then emptied the content, taken what they wanted and left the rest on the ground.

“In other cases they’ve bent the doors back and snapped them off.”

It comes after Lifeline handed out more than 1000 hampers for needy families as part of the Loads of Love campaign, while demand for support over Christmas has increased by 20 per cent from the previous year.

But Mr Tuffield said the damage was hardly the work of desperate people, but rather opportunistic thieves.

“These are opportunists, they’re trying to onsell them I would believe,” he said.

“It’s a planned attack, it happens periodically to us and others.

“It’s very disappointing on a number of fronts, because these people are stealing the content we would normally sell in our shops.

“It’s not been good for donors, for the staff or for the volunteers.”

Mr Tuffield said the organisation would again consider installing CCTV cameras at the donation sites, which would be a further cost consideration.

“It’s going to force us to look at security cameras, which we don’t want to do, but if this keeps happening we might have to,” he said.

If you see anyone vandalising or dumping at donation points, you can call Lifeline Darling Downs on 1300 991 443.