FORTY-SIX per cent of Christians Against Poverty (CAP) clients had considered taking their very own life as a way out of their debt, and nine out of ten reported having sleepless nights from financial anxiety, the charity’s latest report says.
The report, published on Wednesday, draws on a survey of clients of the charity’s debt-help services, which, in 2023, were offered at greater than 400 church-based centres across the UK.
In addition, CAP runs money-management courses, in an try to pre-empt the slide into problem debt (News, 2 February).
On Tuesday morning, the charity’s chief executive, Stewart McCulloch, said that, while the headline figures on inflation were improving, increases in the price of living remained acute for tens of millions of individuals within the UK.
“The crisis for therefore many tens of millions — and we’re talking tens of millions here — is definitely nowhere near ending. While we’re doing all we will with all we’ve got, it’s really necessary that those within the Church recognise that there continues to be one heck of a hill to climb with a purpose to restore the affordability of even the fundamentals of the people we work with.”
The CAP report says that 19 per cent of its clients went every day without heating, and nine per cent didn’t turn the lights on. Mental and physical health was also affected: on a regular basis acts similar to answering the phone or opening the front door became frightening for the vast majority of clients.
Sixty-four per cent said that anxiety made a pre-existing health condition worse, and 48 per cent reported that it triggered recent health problems.
Almost one quarter of CAP’s clients waited greater than three years before in search of help, and almost two-thirds waited greater than a yr. About a half reported that embarrassment or shame had prevented their in search of help earlier.
Mr McCulloch said that CAP’s church-based model gave it a presence in local communities in probably the most deprived parts of the UK, and the charity was capable of spread the word about its services organically, through local networks, in addition to in national campaigns.
Mr McCulloch was not optimistic concerning the extent that electioneering politicians can be addressing such issues.
“I’m pretty upset with all the parties up to now, and I don’t say that evenly: we’re not a political organisation. . . None of them really touch the edges of our clients’ issues,” he said on Tuesday.
The most up-to-date budget included the abolition of charges of debt-relief orders (DROs), a move for which CAP had long lobbied, and which Mr McCulloch described this week as a “hurray moment” (News, 6 March).
There were other helpful easy and comparatively inexpensive policy changes that might be introduced, similar to measures to streamline the advantages system, he said.
CAP advisers help clients to say all the payments to which they’re entitled — something that, it says, is commonly more complicated than it could appear.
Given the size of debt and poverty within the UK, the difficulty ought to be higher up the political agenda, Mr McCulloch said.
“Eight million people have problem debts, and doubtless 14 million would count as in poverty, and then you definately’ve got the tens of millions of Christians and others who see this as a significant issue. [Given all this], we’re form of upset and surprised that isn’t a much bigger issue within the election.”
The full report, Under the Rubble of Debt and Poverty: Client report 2023, may be read on the CAP website.
