A manager is celebrating three years in her role of rescuing desperate people from personal debt.

In 2012 Claire Donaldson joined Christians Against Poverty (CAP), a UK debt counselling charity based in St Mary's Church in Church End, Walthamstow, and has helped hundreds of people tackle their own financial crisis.

The branch was founded in 2010 when church members decided they needed to do more to help the local community.

This year, the team have helped 25 families by offering free advice, in a face-to-face service with five other families becoming completely debt-free.

Centre manager Claire Donaldson said: “We have been in a lot of homes during the five years our centre has been open and learned about some very sad situations.

"Debt can be so destructive, making people feel so desperate, scared to go out or even open the curtains.

“Relationships come under a lot of stress and people worry about keeping their home and providing for their families.

“However, we’ve also seen that however terrible something appears, there is always a solution and the benefit of the way CAP works is that it is really thorough, taking someone step by step to becoming debt free.”

"Our service is available to everyone regardless of age, gender, faith or background."

"There is such a variety of reasons that people fall into debt including low income, relationship breakdown, joblessness, problems with benefits, illness or bereavement."

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