en-us http://backend.userland.com/rss Your Friends @ Myvesta.org.uk (stever@myvesta.org) myvestaukblog_archive.html stever@myvesta.org 114868463789323143 Recent research by Citizens Advice states that many people turning to them for help are getting deeper into debt from which it will take them a lifetime to escape.

A report published by the charity reveals that CAB debt clients owe an average of £13,153 - almost a third more than they did three years ago, and the equivalent of 17.5 times their total monthly household income. It will take them an average of 77 years to pay off the money they owe at a rate they can afford.

Consumer credit debt problems brought to Citizens Advice Bureaux have doubled over the last eight years, accounting for three-quarters of the 1.25 million new debt cases dealt with by the national network last year.

Survey data involving 567 debt clients from 61 bureaux across England and Wales confirms that CAB debt clients tend to be considerably worse off than the population at large, with household incomes less than half the national average. And more than two-thirds of those surveyed were entirely or partly dependent on benefit income.

The charity is urging the Government to press ahead with plans for a new low cost, out of court insolvency remedy, the Debt Relief Order, targeted at debtors with low incomes and assets. It says this would offer hope to those too poor to take advantage of other debt remedies such as county court administration orders, bankruptcy and Individual Voluntary Arrangements (IVAs).

It says getting the new remedy onto the statute books quickly is especially important if major new Government funding being pumped into providing much more free, independent debt advice for those on the lowest incomes is to be effective.

'Deeper in debt' is published at the same time as a separate report, 'Out of the red', highlighting the range and extent of debt advice already being delivered by Citizens Advice Bureaux up and down the country. The two reports will be launched today at an event at the Department of Trade and Industry.

24 May 2006