A CHAUFFEUR has branded those responsible for stealing a laptop containing his family’s history “scum of the earth”.

Richard Arrandale discovered his home in Oxford Road, Kidlington, had been burgled when he returned home from work.

Thieves had taken the family’s washing machine, dishwasher, two televisions, a stereo system and a DVD player.

Also stolen was the laptop which contained a 12-year family history project which his father, Bryan Arradale, aged 87, had been working on.

The 52-year-old, who is a private chauffeur and lives with his wife Hazel, 55, who works at Oxford University as a PA, said: “If we don’t get it back it is lost for good and that really does annoy me. Other stuff you can replace.”

The stepfather-of-two said when he returned home from London shortly after 10pm last Friday he found his 14-year-old springer spaniel, Berwyn, sitting on the front door step “shivering”.

Mr Arrandale, who moved to the UK from New Zealand, and has lived in Kidlington for around 20 years, said: “I am still fuming that somebody has been in here and taken stuff.”

He said there were usually up to four foreign language students lodging at his Oxford Road home but no one was in last Friday and his wife was away on a business trip.

He said: “Some of my wife’s jewellery was on the mantle piece in the bedroom but they left it. The people who did it are just scum of the earth.”

The chauffeur’s home was burgled more than five years ago and the intruders took a television and golf clubs.

He yesterday said he no longer felt safe in the village and was thinking about installing CCTV, adding: “I have lost the trust.”

Police said the break-in happened between 2pm and 10.30pm on Friday.

Pc Simon Travis, from Banbury police station,said: “It happened at a very busy junction on a regular bus route.”

The goods stolen were a Whirlpool Dreamline washing machine, a Whirlpool dishwasher, a 65inch and a 32inch Samsung television, a Bose stereo system, a Sony laptop and a Samsung blue-ray DVD player.

Household burglary statistics for the village were last night unavailable, but figures for Cherwell show reports of burglaries in the area fell 15 per cent from 209 in 2011/12 to 178 in 2012/13.

Call the police on 101 with any information.