A LEADING children's charity is appealing for volunteers across south Essex to consider becoming phone counsellors.

ChildLine needs more openminded listeners to help vulnerable children.

Over the past year, 51,947 calls were handled from the London headquarters, close to Liverpool Street station.

Full training and on-going support and supervision is given to all volunteers.

Helen Beattie, service manager at ChildLine, said: “Our team of volunteers really are heroes to us and more importantly to the children who we work to protect, and so we wanted to celebrate them and the fantastic things they do to make our work with vulnerable children possible.

“I would like to appeal to local people in south Essex to become ChildLine volunteers.

“If you’re a good listener, open minded and can commit to a regular weekly four-hour shift for a minimum of one year after training, then counselling at ChildLine could definitely be the role for you.”

For more information, visit nspcc.org.uk/volunteer or call 020 7650 3200.