FOR many, the Citizens Advice Bureau is the first port of call in a crisis. Whether it’s families in debt, information on benefits or even the quality of local milk, it’s the place to go for reliable, impartial advice.

This year Southend CAB celebrates 100 years of helping the town’s people with the full range of problems, personal, legal and financial, serious and trivial.

The bureau began in the town as the old Southend Corp-oration’s a Guild of Help, in 1908. It became the Citizens Advice Bureau in 1939 following a change brought about by Act of Parliament. To mark the centenary, Southend Council has planted a colourful flower bed in Clifftown Parade.

Surprisingly, CAB manager Trish Carpenter, 47, says, in some ways, very little has changed since those early days.

“The bureau is still giving advice on the same sorts of areas – money worries and housing problems,” she explains.

In 1908, the Guild of Help handled about 1,000 inquiries. Last year, more than 17,000 people got in contact.

One of the original guild’s jobs was to hand out money to people in need, help them find work – even to provide specs for the short-sighted. It also helped with the necessities of life, providing the needy with milk, clothes and medicine.

In 2008, debt is the big thing – in fact, it dominates the daily agenda.

It accounted for about 10 per cent of the workload last year and, as the cost of living soars and money and credit becomes harder to get, it is expected to make up 20 per cent of the CAB’s cases in the coming months.

Mrs Carpenter says: “In the past 18 months, we have seen a rise in debt problems and this will continue.

“Previously, people were having problems with unsecured loans and having trouble paying the back.

“Now, we are seeing more and more cases of people who are having trouble simply dealing with day-to-day bills. I think this will continue.

“One of the first things we do is to ask someone to work out exactly what they owe. Sometimes this, in itself, can be a huge relief.”

Mrs Carpenter’s predecessor, Colin George still has memories of the last time money was this tight. He was there during the recession in the early Nineties and recalls: “There was very high unemployment and this impacted on a lot of people.”

Mr George oversaw the bureau’s move from Nelson Street, to its present, bigger, base in Church Road.

The CAB now has 75 staff – 42 of them trained volunteer advisers.

Mrs Carpenter says: “The slogan for our organisation is: ‘Whoever you are, whatever the problem’.

“In many ways, the old guild paved the way for lots of pieces of legislation, by recognising where people needed help.

“We offer people the complete A to Z, from cradle to the grave – in fact, even before the cradle and after the grave. We can offer advice to women who are expecting babies – and to people who need to make arrangements after a loved one has died.”

Give such a broad scope, it’s hardly surprising to learn the service has had its fair share of unusual requests, too.

One query which brought a smile to Trish Carpenter’s face concerned goat’s milk.

Mrs Carpenter recalls: “I remember when I first started, a woman called me to say her son was moving to Southend from Cambridge, “She wanted to know if he could buy goat’s milk in the town.

“I told her there was a Waitrose here and she was delighted.”