Only way to pay bills is to starve

The effect of the rising prices, added to the increasing cost of food, is forcing those in some of the town's poorest households to go without food in order to switch on their heating and lighting.

The situation shows the dramatic impact of Bognor's traditional status as a town of low wages and low skills at a time of worsening inflation.

Advisors at a Bognor Regis help point have highlighted the the terrible plight of those going hungry. They used the Citizens' Advice Bureau's latest annual meeting to warn the situation is going to get even worse.

Rachael Walker, a money advice co-ordinator at the bureau, said: "Many of our clients are now coming to us with gas or electricity bills that they are not able to pay back along with their ongoing usage.

"And... we have seen some cases where clients are cutting back on their food just so they can have their gas or electricity."

She put the numbers involved in going without food as 'a growing minority'. She described their mood as depressed and distressed.

"We are expecting the current situation to worsen," warned Miss Walker.

This is one sign of how the dramatically-changed financial situation of the past 12 months is taking its toll on the CAB's clients.

Cases of debt seen by its volunteers and advisors have soared by 25 per cent in the year to the end of March.

The subject is now the second biggest handled at the bureau's town hall offices. It involved about 1,700 inquiries. Only the related subject of benefits '“ at about 2,850 inquiries '“ was bigger.

Bureau manager Tony Mackown said some individuals who approached the bureau were more than 100,000 in the red. The average debt of individuals asking for help was 30,000.

They could typically have 15-20 cards on which their debts were amassed.

In recent years, such arrears could be paid off by rising property values.

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That was no longer the case with the housing market meltdown putting people in debt with no ready source of cash.

"We are now beginning to see negative equity appear again," he said, "among those who bought their homes recently."

He stated the bureau was searching for more money to provide assistance to those coming through its doors with complex debt problems.

"We are becoming overstretched but we want to help local people and we are desperately trying to find alternative sources of funding to enable us to do that," he commented.

In contrast to those levels of debt, the average full-time wage in the Arun district last year was just 20,280. House prices were 235,208 to immediately put a strain on household budgets. Miss Walker said more and more clients were facing their homes being repossessed and still being left with debts.

The financial doom and gloom was worsened by an increasing number of banks and building societies no longer freezing their interest and charges on clients' accounts.

They are also keeping hold of the accounts, rather than passing them to debt collectors who froze interest payments and accepted token payments.

"It is leaving many of our clients in difficult circumstances," she explained, "where they cannot afford to go bankrupt, the creditors won't make them bankrupt, they cannot afford to make any large repayment on the debt and the debt is continuing to rise because interest is being added every month.

"This has been very disheartening to our clients.".