The statistics vary so wildly, you really need to take them with a pinch of salt.

The average UK household will be £10,000 in debt by 2020, according to a report on personal debt in March. UK adults will owe an average of more than £47,000 by 2020 said the Money Charity in April. According to a TV poll last year, households already owe an average of £54,000.

The fact is a small debt can have just as devastating an impact on a family as a large one, if it is unmanageable.

In particular, it can affect children. If there isn't enough to cover day-to-day costs, a family may not be able to pay to replace worn out clothes, buy toys or heat rooms. Days out are off the agenda.

A parent who is skipping meals to ensure children are fed, or losing sleep, is suffering directly, but that in itself is likely to affect children too.

These are among the reasons why the charity Children 1st set up a new service in February to help an increasing number families they already work with who struggle with debt. Some are caused, the charity says, by government welfare reforms.

Tackling Money Worries plans to work with 60 families a year and has already enabled 34 Glasgow families to access £134,152 in cash they are due, while giving them the tools to manage their debts.

That's the jargony description. In reality this means money advisor Alison McLaughlin sitting down in the middle of the floor with a woman like Margaret, and tipping bills out of a carrier bag into which they have been thrust and deliberately forgotten.

Alison helps people get on top of messes like this. Legal support is provided by partners the Govan Law Centre, whose senior solicitor Lorna Walker is part of the team.

"My husband left me in so much debt from gambling," says Margaret who works as a cleaner. "By the time I found out I was over my head and in mortgage arrears."

She has six children, the youngest only three, who she raises alone. Her crushing debt burden has been eased, by approaching lenders about debts that were not her fault and ensuring she claims what she is entitled to. The impact of that is dramatic, for her and her children, she says. "It is baby steps, but we're getting there. I feel a million times better."