Street cleaners "go extra mile" to find lost handbag (From Wandsworth Guardian)

Street cleaners "go extra mile" to find lost handbag

7:00am Monday 4th June 2012 in News

A Southfields woman has been reunited with the contents of her handbag after a street cleaning teams trawled through a tonne of rubbish to find it.

The woman’s purse, money, bank cards and driving licence went missing last Thursday after she accidentally left the bag in the gutter by the side of the road in Skeena Hill, Southfields.

It was then swept up by a street cleaning crew and thrown in the back of one of the caged vehicles used by the teams.

Later that day her son went to the council’s street cleaning depot to see if there was any chance the bag could be traced.

The cleaning crew were quickly traced and they began sifting through a one-tonne pile of rubbish, mattresses and cardboard boxes until they found the missing bag.

Although the bag itself was too damaged to be used again, its contents were absolutely fine.

A spokesman for Wandsworth Council paid tribute to the crew for their dedication and "willingness to go the extra mile" to help.

The two man crew - Terry Beale and Bill Davies and their supervisor, Daren Holder who arranged for the search - are all employed by the council’s street cleaning contractor Fountains Group