CHARITY begins at home, according to the old proverb, but nowadays it often follows you down the street and rattles a tin under your nose when you pop into town to do a spot of shopping.

The sight of charity collectors, or “chuggers” as they have become labelled (the term is a somewhat unkind conflation of the words “charity” and “mugger”) are as commonplace on our pavements as buskers, Greggs pasty wrappers and those annoying characters who try to sign you up for a new credit card.

No matter how sympathetic we are towards the plight of whichever stricken group we’re asked to consider, most of us at some point have put our heads down and rushed past. It is not that we are hard of heart or tight of fist, it is just that few of us feel flush enough to donate to every charity that asks for our support.

In fairness to charities, many of them have resorted to this street-based approach because giving habits have changed. Chuggers primarily, but by no means exclusively, target younger donors, in a bid to sign them up on long-term payment plans. Good causes have found that young people don’t plan their giving in the way that their parents and grandparents did. Fewer of them join clubs or societies, for example, where charity giving is a prerequisite of membership, so the thinking is that they need a little nudge to dig deep. But at peak times in many of our towns clusters of clipboard-wielding collectors have become a concern for shoppers and traders.

A clampdown has now been announced in Darlington that will mean they are banned from the town centre on certain days and restricted to operate in set locations. We believe this is a sensible compromise. Good causes deserve our support but some of the more persistent collectors can be a nuisance.

Anyone hoping they would chugger off for good, however, will be disappointed.