Life Beyond Debt

The Zacchaeus 2000 Trust was founded in 1996 and registered as a Charitable Trust in 1997. Having worked for 10 years as volunteers we made important advances in 2007 raising £220,000 for the three years from 2007 - 2010 to employ, two lawyers, an administrator, rent an office and pay core costs to enable development of the three pronged work of the trust.

Our work focuses on:

• Individual cases where vulnerable and impoverished debtors are faced with the harsh enforcement of council tax, rent, fines and tax credit overpayments etc,
• Training volunteer members of NGOs to be McKenzie Friends to do this work, everyone has a right to a “friend” to give them assistance in court won in the High Court by a man called McKenzie.
• Lobbying parliament about inadequate statutory minimum incomes, the enforcement procedures of rent, council tax, fines, tax credit, benefit overpayments and the use of bailiffs as they impinge aggressively on the impoverished vulnerable people we serve.

A significant cause of debt in the UK is the inadequacy of statutory minimum incomes for people in work, unemployed or pensioners. We are petitioning the government for independent and transparent research into the minimum incomes needed for healthy living with the support of 68 Non Governmental Organisations.

For more information please visit www.z2k.org