A charity for the disabled says its recent success in gaining lottery money is discouraging further donations.

Haworth Riding for Disabled, in Vale Mill Lane, which offers therapeutic riding lessons to people with a range of disabilities, announced in August it had received nearly £380,000 from the national lottery.

The group relies on volunteers and persistently works to fundraise each year to stay afloat. Now the organisation’s secretary and instructor, Jackie Butterfield, fears the Big Lottery Fund grant may have been misinterpreted by some people.

“We can only spend it on wages and running costs — not on anything else,” she stressed. “We’re having some difficulty because we’ve had one or two people contacting us saying they were going to donate but won’t now because we’ve had the lottery money.

“People assume we can do what we want with the money but we can’t. We have to follow very strict guidelines.

“The lottery actually wants us to keep fundraising because they want to see that we’re not solely reliant on them and can keep going when the grant money runs out.”

The group is not allowed to use the lottery cash to put a roof over its Vale Mill Stables, to enable disabled people to continue riding in bad weather.

It won final planning permission for the project in May of this year but needs to find £80,000 to complete the development.

Jackie said building a sheltered area would mean the group would not have to cancel sessions due to wet and windy conditions.

As part of its drive to raise funds for the roof, it is holding a curry evening at Azeem’s restaurant in Keighley on Tuesday, from 6-8.30pm.

Tickets are £16 each, £8 of which will go to Haworth Riding for Disabled. Remaining tickets can be bought by calling Jackie on 07771 531058.