Martin Lewis donates £50,000 of own money to help Leeds charity Money Buddies at 'breaking point" as living costs surge

Martin, who is the founder of Money Saving Expert and regularly appears on ITV, took to Twitter to share his frustration following a phone call on Thursday's This Morning Show.

A disabled person who uses home care equipment had contacted the show asking Martin for advice after their energy bills increased to unmanageable amounts.

Martin said: "Bloody depressing This Morning phone-in again. So many people at crisis point regarding energy bills - including those with very high usage due to disabilities (home ventilators, oxygen concentrators, electric wheel chairs etc).

"I am nearly OUT OF TOOLS to help. Government must intervene."

Leeds charity Money Buddies, which offers services across the city, then replied to the Tweet to share their own experiences.

It told the TV host that it has seen twice as many people are expected in the last few months and has a huge waiting list, stating the charity is "at breaking point".

Martin then responded to say that he would donate £50,000 to help "get things in place" and that he would be getting the donation

CEO and Founder of Money Buddies, Sylvia Simpson, said: "I had to look twice. I was amazed. I thought did I just read that right?

"Then I thought well, do you know what he's asked if we could make a difference very quickly and yes, we can actually because we've got staff working part time and we can just increase the hours quite quickly.

"It was an amazing feeling, especially when you get to that point where your organization's at breaking point just because of the demand for the services and you know there's not a lot of funding and you know you can't increase anybody's hours and then somebody offers you that."

"It's just like 'oh thank God.'"

Sylvia said that the Money Buddies staff are struggling to meet the demand for services in Leeds, as many come to them for help with advice, support and help with difficulties like eviction notices.

The rising cost in living and energy prices is also causing many people in the city serious concern.

She said: "We are at breaking point. I was really serious when I said this because not long before I made that comment, one of the senior leaders in our team came to me and said: 'Sylvia, we have no appointments spare'.

"We have a waiting list of 71 people, we've got evictions coming in every day, as opposed to one a month.

"Our staff are going to burn out, they are struggling.

"Where we've got people in evictions, we're dealing with the eviction and having to put them back on the waiting list because we've got another client with another eviction.

"There's just not enough funding for us to deliver the services that are in demand so Martin's generous donation helps a bit but it only touches the tip of the iceberg for us

"We do work with other organisations in Leeds that also provide money advice. We try and share clients between us so that we can balance out the workload but even after that we still got massive, massive waiting list and appointments booked up."

She added: "Martin's gift is like a little bit of a lifeline.

"It was such an amazing feeling.

"The staff are ecstatic because now they know that they're going to get some resources to help them deal with that demand. I have to say we were really, really grateful and pleased."

Looking forward, Sylvia said she and the charity will be watching Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak's Spring Statement closely on Wednesday, March 23.

Pressure is mounting on Rishi Sunak to offer further cost of living support in the upcoming spring statement as official figures revealed the biggest fall in real pay for more than eight years.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed that with rising prices taken into account, as measured by Consumer Prices Index (CPI) inflation, regular pay fell by 1.6 per cent year-on-year in the three months to January.

It comes as energy bills, national insurance and inflation are set to surge in April, while tax ad student loan repayment thresholds are also frozen. This is alongside fuel prices reaching record levels.

Sylvia said: "Hopefully Rishi Sunak will come up with some positive messages and some positive decisions that will help because I think we've gotten to a point now where the state has to intervene.

"They must intervene. We can't go on like this.

"Poverty is going to be everywhere unless they intervene and do something."

Anyone who needs support can find the location of Money Buddies services on the website: www.moneybuddies.org.uk/locationsThe charity has also complied a number of blogs with advice for people concerned about rising costs or facing financial difficulties: www.moneybuddies.org.uk/category/news-blog

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