A TAXI driver needs help to pay for his funeral after being struck down with terminal cancer.

Beloved husband and father Wayne Hopkins, 49, is desperate not to burden his family with debt when he dies – and may only have weeks to live.

The Laindon father has been unable to work since he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma and plasmacytoma, where cancer eats away at the bones, and his wife Shona gave up work to care for him full time.

Now his friends want to support his family when he cannot.

Friend Paula Hanniball set up a GoFundMe page for his funeral and has already raised almost £2,000.

Wayne, who was a taxi driver for 20 years, praised his wife Shona, on how she has looked after him and is worried about her future if he is not around.

He said: “We’ve known each other since Shona was 18 – she was a friend of my sister’s.

“When Shona was 26 we got together and a year later I was diagnosed with cancer and she stuck around and has helped me through it all.

“We have been married just over two years now. I wouldn’t be here without her, she is an angel.

“You don’t expect to have to plan for your funeral, you don’t really think about these things but bad things do happen. We have a 14-year-old and I have two sons from a previous relationship who I’ll be leaving behind.

“Shona has given everything up to look after me and we are broke.”

His three children include Lewis, 24, Kyle, 19, and Aleshia, 14.

Shona told the Echo: “One day Wayne was really poorly.

“He was being sick and it was all black like coffee granules, which as a carer I knew that was a sign of a bleed in the stomach.

“We went down to A & E and Wayne stayed in hospital for two weeks where they eventually found a black mass around his pelvis after several scans.”

He was diagnosed in 2014 having suffered broken ribs weakened by the spread of cancer.

Tragically he has now run out of treatment options.

To donate, visit gofundme.com/f/tew24-emergency