AN AWARD-winning Cowdenbeath cafe is doing its bit to help struggling locals by offering them a free bite to eat.

The Forty Twa Cafe wants to help genuine people who are hungry and has launched a scheme to help those in need.

Owner Gary Spence said he was spurred on to make the kind-hearted offer after listening to customers in his eatery.

"I actually overheard a conversation when people were in the cafe," he told the Times. "They were on about what time they can put their heating on when they got home. It absolutely broke my heart.

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"There should never be a choice to someone having to keep warm. It should not be a choice in life."

Posting on the cafe's Facebook page, the cafe team said they know how difficult this time of year can be.

"People sometimes have to make choices of eating or being warm so we have decided to help as and when we can.

"From Tuesday we will have meals available for genuine hungry people and we can’t stress this enough" they stated. "It’s for people who have not many choices and choosing to eat actually shouldn’t be a choice. These meals have been paid by staff of the cafe as well as kind hearted customers and it’s all to help genuine people who are struggling.

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"If you are someone who is genuinely struggling and hungry, then please come down to the cafe, help yourself to a ticket. Give it to the staff and we will get the meal prepared for you. Please don’t feel embarrassed as there really are more people than we will ever know that are struggling.

"If you are one of the few lucky ones who doesn’t struggle often then please help us out with this cause and help us to help others by paying for a meal upfront. No one deserves to be hungry."

Gary said they have been overwhelmed already by people contacting them wanting to help.

He added: "People have come in and I have actually had someone calling from Inverness. They had seen the post and thought it was such a lovely thing and she paid over the phone for something for someone.=

"There are a lot of kind-hearted people in this world still."