Two people who personally received more than £70,000 in charity donations pledged for a homeless man hailed a hero after the Manchester Arena attacks say they have yet to spend £21,000 of the money.

The Guardian asked last week where the cash, donated by members of the public via the crowdfunding site JustGiving for a man called Steve Jones, had gone.

JustGiving said it had been paid out to the page owners, who donated it to “local homeless shelters” after they were unable to track down Jones, who told reporters that he had rushed to help injured children after the bomb on 22 May.



But apart from a £10,000 donation to the Booth Centre, a homelessness charity in Manchester, the Guardian had been unable to find any shelters in Greater Manchester who received any money from either fund.

JustGiving now says much of the money in fact went on sleeping bags, tents, gift cards for Greggs the bakery and clothes at Primark, and that the page owners still had £10,000 and £11,000 each.

The site took 5% of the money (£3,842) in fees.

A spokesman on Thursday provided a breakdown of where the money had been spent by the two individuals who started the appeals.



Graeme Seddon’s page raised more than £40,000. According to JustGiving, he donated £10,000 to the Booth Centre, as well as £7,000 to the Whitechapel, a Liverpool homeless charity, and £4,000 to Paper Cup, another charity based in Liverpool.

Diane Moore, who raised £31,562 on her page, has donated a total of £3,000 to three Manchester charities, JustGiving said. She spent a further £12,000 on goods to distribute directly to homeless people, according to JustGiving.

The JustGiving spokesman said: “Both page owners are well known in Manchester, Leeds and Liverpool for their help with the homeless and regularly take part in volunteer work. They have both spent parts of the money raised on tangible items to help those in need directly. Diane has spent £4,000 on sleeping bags, £2,000 on tents, £2,200 on Greggs gift cards, £1,000 on emergency blankets, and £3,000 on clothes at Primark. Graeme has similarly spent £10,000 in this way.

“Currently, Diane has approximately £11,000 left to spend on charitable causes, and Graeme £10,000.”

JustGiving said the funds were released to the page owners in November, after “extensive consultation” with both page owners as to how the money would be spent.

The spokesman said: “As neither of them had expected to be put in a situation where Steve couldn’t be found, it seems reasonable that they have taken their time in working out how best to use this money to help the homeless community.

“We are proud of the generosity the JustGiving community showed towards Steve Jones. While these funds couldn’t help him specifically, we feel it’s a very positive outcome that the money has been used in such a beneficial way for homeless people in the north-west.”