POPPIES and poppy containers have been destroyed by council workers after the Royston Royal British Legion headquarters were demolished earlier than expected.

Secretary Malcolm Cooper, of East End Crescent had written to the council to ask them to remove the legion sign from outside of the building and to contact poppy organiser Les Barrell about the poppies and containers stored inside.

He received a letter back stating the building was due to be knocked down this week but it had already been demolished last Friday.

Malcolm said: "I was disgusted, we all were. They binned everything on Wednesday and Thursday in two skips."

He said he had asked for the sign taking down because it made the group look inactive but had wanted to keep the poppies and containers, some of which had already been prepared for Remembrance Day in November.

Malcolm added: "I tried to phone the council when the building was being demolished. If I hadn't written to them it would have been different but I had already told them what we wanted to do."

Malcolm said Les and chairman Tom Heaton had managed to salvage a few boxes of poppies and some containers but could not get to the bottom of the skip.

He added: "We will have to make arrangements with Goff Griffiths, the Barnsley group poppy organiser, who will provide us with some more."