At Citizens Advice, we’re helping more people than ever before who can’t afford to cover essential costs – like food, energy and housing. This gives us unique insights into how the cost of living crisis has affected people in the North & West Kent area. This dashboard uses data from our case records to illustrate that effect and show the work we do to help.
The dashboard is a work in progress. New slides will be added in time, but the dashboard will update in place. So you’ll always have the most up to date version.
Many of these slides are interactive. Choose from the available options to see different perspectives on our data.
Using our six key indicators, we can see that cost-of-living clients have continued to rise through 2023 and into 2024. On average we help more clients with these issues than we ever have, and in recent months energy debt, unaffordable energy costs, homelessness, and council tax arrears all experienced their highest post-lockdown numbers.
44% increase in cost-of-living issues in March 2024 vs March 2023
As food bank referrals have increased over the last three years, so too has the number of people coming back in need of more support. We make more repeat referrals to food banks now than we did total referrals before the pandemic.
In 2023, 44% of our food bank clients had been helped before compared to 33% in 2022
Despite decreases in the energy price cap, energy debts and unaffordable costs continue to be a significant pressure on North & West Kent communities. We expect another hard winter to drive clients to our door for help from our specialist energy team in saving money on their bills, dealing with debt, and helping keep their homes warm.
We helped 42% more people with unaffordable energy bills this winter than last
Since 2020, the number of clients coming to us for debt support has continued to rise. While crisis support such as food bank referrals or fuel vouchers offer immediate support for these clients, it’s our ability to advise on the issues driving them into hardship that is most effective at helping prevent future crises.
March 2024 saw 3.5x as many debt clients as we had at the start of the pandemic, and 1.4x as many as a year ago.
We continue to see increases in the number of clients with actual or threatened homelessness issues. These are complex and lengthy cases, handled by our Adviceline advisers and our specialist Homelessness Prevention team, but increasingly common as cost-of-living drives further hardship in North & West Kent.
22% more clients in 2024 with homelessness issues than at the same point in 2020