'Enormous rise' in debt counselling
The number of debt enquiries has doubled over the past decade, according to Citizens Advice.
The charity now deals with an average of 7,241 new debt problems every day and on average, people who went to Citizens Advice seeking help last year were £16,971 in debt. The number of redundancy enquiries handled by Citizens Advice also doubled between April and November last year.
David Harker, chief executive of Citizens Advice, said: “We have seen an enormous rise in the number of people turning to us for help because they have lost their job, and we can expect to see many more people struggling with severe debt problems as the recession continues.”
More than 300 Citizens Advice centres in England and Wales are extending their opening hours from now until March 2010 to assist an estimated 600,000 extra clients.
