A charity is appealing to the UK s largest food retailer to stay in its shop beyond the New Year. The Garden House Hospice charity shop in the Elmes Arcade, in High Street, Stevenage, is due to become a Tesco Extra. The hospice has been told it must vacat

A charity is appealing to the UK's largest food retailer to stay in its shop beyond the New Year.

The Garden House Hospice charity shop in the Elmes Arcade, in High Street, Stevenage, is due to become a Tesco Extra.

The hospice has been told it must vacate the premises by January 9 but wants to stay until the supermarket moves in. Tesco has given no date it intends to open a store in the Old Town.

Since Garden House Hospice was told it would have to find alternative premises, it has searched throughout Stevenage for a new site but without any joy.

The Old Town shop brings in �1,000 a week to the charity and accounts for a quarter of its profits.

Garden House Hospice general manager Jenny Lupton said: "Of course we would like to stay in the shop for as long as possible and we are contacting Tesco to see whether there is any way we can.

"Staff have looked at a number of possible options but none of them has been satisfactory. We want to stay in Stevenage Old Town but at the moment there are no empty shops.

"We want to stay where people know there has been a Garden House charity shop for many years; where people can walk past and come into a shop.

"We are now just hoping for a positive response from Tesco which will give us more time to find a suitable building to move into.