An appeal for 20 tonnes of road grit for the Jewish community has been launched by a Manchester volunteer group.

Chaverim (Friends), a group of 18 Orthodox Jews, runs a 24-hour free callout service to help local people with anything from a broken-down car to being locked out of their house. For the third year running they are gritting residential roads in Jewish north Manchester neighbourhoods after a local kosher shop donated a road gritting machine to the group. But donations have shrunk and Chaverim have appealed for the £3,500 cost of road grit needed to cover roads the local authority do not.

Moshe Kaye who directs Chaverim, a registered charity, says funding problems are exacerbated by a hike in grit prices.

"Last year we ran out and we bought salt from a local abattoir used for koshering meat. Twenty tonnes should last the entire winter, but we don't know how the weather is going to go."

The group, which answers 150 calls from across the community each week, including recently rescuing a boy left in Preston in a school trip mix-up, store the grit in warehouses belonging to members of the community.

'Last year we ran out and we bought salt from a local abattoir’