THOUSANDS-OF-POUNDS are needed to ensure Clevedon’s town centre is adorned with colourful festive lights this Christmas.

The community group, Clevedon Pride, has seen a massive drop in donations and sponsorship to help pay for the installation of lights in the shopping areas of Queens Square and Old Church Road compared with last year.

More than �10,000 is needed to cover the costs of installing, maintaining and taking down the decorations during the festive period but according to Clevedon Pride chairman Louise Player there is ‘still a long way to go’.

She said: “We are really struggling. We really need more contributions from businesses to be able to pay for the lights.

“Putting them up and taking them down costs us a lot of money. It is quite an expensive task unfortunately.

“It has been a hard year for traders and we have lost quite a few shops in the town. We have also not seen the numbers of people at our fundraising events this year.”

Clevedon Pride is a voluntary group that carries out tasks including litter picking and planting in the town centre, however, fundraising throughout the year for the Christmas lights is the group’s biggest task.

The group already has the lights that it uses every year, but cannot currently cover the costs of an electrician needed to install and maintain them.

Clevedon Pride volunteers are due to meet in September when they will analyse how much money they have and whether they can afford to install the lights this year.

* Anyone who can offer a donation or sponsorship or anyone who can offer their services as an electrician can call Louise Player on 01275 541298 or Julie Bisacre on 544232.