A concert to provide welfare pensions for former Gurkha soldiers is being held in the North-East this week.

The Band of the Brigade of Gurkhas and the Pipes and Drums of the 2nd Gurkha Battalion will perform at the Dolphin Centre, Darlington, on Friday.

The concert is sponsored by motor dealers Sherwoods, whose managing director, Alisdair MacConachie, is vice-lord lieutenant of County Durham.

He is the son of a former Gurkha Rifles officer who commanded a battalion in the recapture of Burma.

A former soldier, Mr MacConachie and his family are lifelong supporters of the Gurkha Welfare Trust.

Lieutenant Colonel Denis O'Leary, who served with the 7th Gurkha Rifles, said the trust raises money for former Gurkha soldiers and their families in Nepal.

He said: "The soldiers didn't serve long enough in the Second World War to achieve an Army pension and with the running down of the British Army in the 1960s we had to lose a lot of men who hadn't served long enough to receive a pension.

"They now live in Nepal in very distressed circumstances and many of them are completely destitute. The Gurkha Welfare Trust is trying to provide them with a monthly pension of about £20, which keeps them just above the starvation level."

The trust provides 11,500 welfare pensions. Other projects include providing clean drinking water, building a footbridge over a gorge and funding medical needs.

Tickets for the concert, which starts at 7.30pm, cost £10, £8 and £6 and are available from the Dolphin Centre on (01325) 388410.