A Dunedin local who has been giving free skateboarding lessons to the city’s new migrants is hoping to encourage even more people into the sport by opening up to the wider community.

“We started teaching new migrants - a friend of ours who is part of our group now had a contact in the Red Cross and said it would be great to see if any of them were interested in learning how to skate. And sure enough, a couple came along for a lesson, and then next week more came along, and it started growing that way.”

He said they had given lessons to dozens of people, with the Saturday morning lessons selling out for every session so far.