garden), and amongst other things I want to grow gooseberries,
blackcurrants, white currants and red currants. Fortunately, we have wild
patches of all of those growing locally, so it seems obvious that a good
way
of getting plants is to take cuttings.

I presume you mean feral rather than wild. The problem is that you will not
know the cultivar and its characteristics. It may seem a cheap way to
acquire plants but you may well find it is false economy.