Are you struggling to make ends meet in austerity Britain?

Have cuts in benefits affected you or your children? Are you stuck in a cramped flat while waiting on a council housing list for a larger home? Or working all hours in a low-paid job to try to support your family?

Or are you a young person who has just left school or further education, and who can't see any hope of getting a decent job?

If so, we’d like to hear from you.

Our Stamp Out Poverty campaign aims to work with local charities and organisations to look for ways to make life a little better for those hardest hit by the recession.

But first, we want to shine a light on the struggles faced by ordinary people in York and North Yorkshire just to make ends meet.

That means talking to real people – people like you – about just how difficult your lives have become in an era of unemployment, benefit cuts, and cuts to vital services.

We know that some poverty will always be with us.

We know that we are not going to be able to eradicate it with one campaign in your local newspaper.

But we don’t think it is right that, a hundred years after Seebohm Rowntree, a child born in the poorest areas of York can expect to live 11 years less than one born in a richer area.

And we don’t think it is right that multinational corporations should get away with paying little or no tax, while support for the most vulnerable people in our society is cut to the bone.

The Archbishop of York says that a more equal society is a happier society – and that you can judge how healthy a society is by how its treats the most vulnerable people.

We agree.

So please, if you are finding life a struggle, tell us about it.

Your stories will help us make the case for change.

• If you have been struggling to make ends meet, or to find a job or a decent place to live, contact Kate Liptrot on 01904 567168 / kate.liptrot@thepress.co.uk or Stephen Lewis on 01904 567263 / stephen.lewis@thepress.co.uk