SIR - It was with dismay that I read Emma Clayton’s column on July 23, ‘Why are charity shop staff so rude?’.

In it she complained about how she was treated trying to donate her lockdown lumber tarring every charity shop bar one with the same negative brush.

Cancer Research UK opened again at the beginning of July greeted with joy by our faithful valued customers.

We are conscious that we need to continue to raise funds for our cancer research scientists.

We need donations but we have very little room to store them and we have to leave them for 72 hours before processing them and, indeed, some of these donations should have gone directly to the tip not to a charity shop.

Emma was correct to say that charity shops are largely staffed by volunteers.

We are returning to work adhering to all the Covid-19 rules. Some of our volunteers are not back yet because they are still shielding so staffing is tight and we are all feeling a bit nervous in this ‘new normal’.

However we pride ourselves on our customer service. The last three times a ‘Mystery Shopper’ visited us we got 100% and we always try our best to be welcoming and polite. Our customers have been wonderful, wearing masks and conscious of us doing them a service too helping them to donate goods to a charity which they hold dear to their hearts.

Maybe Emma’s empathy could have shone in a final paragraph understanding why charity shop staff are not rude just trying to do a voluntary job under very challenging circumstances.

Sue Ellis, Abbotsway, York