Bureau still waging war for citizens now battles for cash

When the Citizens Advice Bureau started back in 1939 the country was at war.

It was set up as an emergency service and on September 4, just one day after war was declared, 200 bureaus swung into action for the first time. The Wakefield CAB was among those that opened its doors, helping families that had been bombed out, lost contact with relatives, or needed help with housing.

These days, it isn’t bomb victims who come seeking support, but its services are in greater demand than ever before. This increase has coincided not only with the worst recession in living memory but huge Government budget cuts. In February, the CAB’s chief executive Gillian Guy warned the service could be facing a 45 per cent drop in funding as a result of these public sector cuts, with some centres being forced to close. It’s a perilous situation not only for many of the 394 bureaus across the country, but the thousands of people who depend on them.

Despite the impending cuts the Wakefield bureau is in a stable position having secured a three-year funding contract with the city’s council and the Legal Services Commission, shortly before the cuts were announced last year. As well as its main office, Wakefield CAB has outreach branches in Normanton, Featherstone, South Elmsall, Hemsworth, Pontefract and Castleford, along with advisers at four GP practices in the district. They have 68 trained volunteers and 30 paid staff who help 12,000 people, both over the phone and face-to-face, every year.

The CAB, a not-for-profit charity, has twin aims – to provide free, impartial advice to members of the public and help shape social policy to support the disadvantaged. Each bureau is an independent charity responsible for its own funding and is audited every three years to ensure the service it provides is up to scratch. This service is tailored to give people the advice and information they need, whether it’s giving someone a disability allowance leaflet or putting them in touch with another organisation, or providing legal advice about employment or debt issues.

The annual cost of running the bureau is around £750,000 and the more funding they get the more people they can help.

“We see a thousand people a month, but we would never run out of clients,” says Liz Halliday, chief executive of Wakefield CAB. “The figure we see now is four times as many as we saw five years ago and it’s growing all the time. The need for the services we offer is almost overwhelming and if we had double the funding and double the size premises I’m sure we would see double the number of clients.”

The type of people who use their services has changed over time. “The vast majority of our clients are what we would call vulnerable groups, people on low incomes who are sick, disabled, or elderly. We also get a lot of people who have mental health problems, learning difficulties as well as asylum seekers and refugees.

“This means the nature of the advice we give has become a lot more complex over the years. Our training officer once said to me, ‘if it can happen to a human being we can help them with it’.”

The nature of people’s problems has changed. “At one time we were very much seen as a consumer-style organisation and while we still give people advice on these matters the vast majority of people come to see us with issues relating to money. When I was an advisor 20 years ago I don’t think I ever saw anybody with a debt problem and now 50 per cent of our clients come to us with debt issues.”

Halliday says the credit crunch and the recession have fuelled the increase in those turning to the CAB for help. “The majority of people have debt of some sort, credits cards, mortgages, car loans and so on and they can manage that debt. People usually get into difficulty when their circumstances change unexpectedly, either they become ill and have to leave their job or, and this is happening more often, they are made redundant and suddenly that £3,000 credit card debt becomes a big problem.

“Then there are other groups of people who shouldn’t have got into debt because they can’t deal with it, which is partly down to irresponsible borrowing, but also irresponsible lending. If you have an 18 year-old boy with obvious learning difficulties then mobile phone companies shouldn’t be giving him contract after contract, but these are the sort of things that happen.”

Mandy Larder manages the money advice team at Wakefield where she has seen a shift in those with debt problems.

“We now get professional people coming to us, including high earners who have either lost their job or seen a reduction in their income and they have a bigger crash. We had a client in yesterday who had £50,000 worth of debt with a very reduced income and no way of servicing that debt and no prospect of being able to in the future. In those circumstances you have to look at bankruptcy options and take them through that process.”

At the other end of the spectrum are those on low incomes that can’t get a bank account and are forced to turn to doorstep lenders who often end up paying astronomical amounts of interest.

“Doorstep lending has been around for a long time, but nowadays they are advertising on TV. It’s aimed at people on big estates who might be on benefits and don’t have access to any other forms of credit.

“They don’t normally take out a loan for the sake of it, it’s usually for some kind of crisis in their life that comes up, they may need a new cooker or a fridge. You or I could go into a shop and buy one for £200, but they may be on £65 a week and the type of loans they’re taking out mean they’re probably paying £600 to £800. This might be affordable until there’s another crisis when they have to borrow more and it becomes a vicious circle.”

The CAB has spearheaded numerous campaigns and lobbied for changes, such as the implementation of the Office of Fair Trading’s guidance on debt collection, and its staff work tirelessly to help people understand their rights.

Many of these are volunteers who come from all walks of life. “There’s no such thing as a typical volunteer,” says training officer Pete Hudson. “We get retired barristers and doctors, law graduates starting out on their legal career, as well as people who are out of work and looking for a change of direction.”

Volunteers undergo an intensive five-month training programme before they can start offering advice. “It’s unrivalled in terms of its depth because there is a lot that people need to know. They need to be able to deal with everything from negotiating with bailiffs, to advising people who complain about noisy ice cream vans, and if there’s a change in legislation then we need to know about it.”

Volunteers don’t need legal qualifications or experience as all the relevant training is provided on the job.

“We want people who are non-judgemental, committed and prepared to work as part of a team. We are problem solvers here and there is usually something someone can do. We don’t tell people what they should do, we tell them what they can do. It’s challenging but it’s rewarding and you feel like you’ve made a difference when you finish your shift.”

So what does the future hold for bureaus like Wakefield?

Liz Halliday believes the Government’s planned welfare reforms will have a big impact. “The aim of having a single, universal benefit is that people will always be better off in work. Now broadly we would support that, who wouldn’t, but some people will be worse off, probably people who can’t work, those who are ill, or disabled, and we know we will get a lot more people coming through our doors seeking advice about this. The recession continues to hit, jobs continue to go, so debt will continue to be a big issue as well.”

Despite this, she is optimistic. “I think our future is secure and one of the reasons for that is the government wants the volunteer sector to take over more work and there aren’t any organisations like CABs. We started off helping people during the Second World War and we’re still going, so hopefully we’ll be here for people in the future.”

To find out more about volunteering contact your local CAB or go online at www.citizensadvice.org.uk/join-us

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