A GROUP of Barnsley town centre traders went out into the cold to sleep rough for a night - and raise funds for a homeless charity in the process.

Businessmen such as Dave Mills from Yorkshire Rose took on the unusual challenge on Tuesday night, when temperatures dropped to lows of two degrees.

The miserable night was organised by the traders as a way of raising funds for Action for Barnsley Homeless - a local charity that Dave has supported for many years.

“I volunteer there every Tuesday giving out food to around 80 or so people,” he told the Chronicle.

“It’s not all homeless people which I want to raise awareness of, we help people with additional needs or who are struggling with drugs and alcohol addiction.

“We also pay for the full rent of the building, but obviously there’s still a lot of people to serve and a lot of costs.

“So the idea was that it would raise money, but also something like sleeping rough will obviously raise some attention and make people aware of what’s going on.”

Spending a night in the bitter cold was no easy task, but these dedicated fundraisers - who slept outside the old Superdrug branch in the town centre - made it through and raised more than £1,000 in the process.

Dave said: “We got there about 10pm and it wasn’t particularly cold but by midnight we were feeling it.

“Apparently I slept quite well though, because they told me I was snoring.

“We had a couple of homeless people come to talk to us - they were all very nice.

“At about 4am we got woken up by the bread van coming to deliver for the market and then all the traders started coming in to set up their stalls.”