A FORMER managing director has spoken of how his life was turned upside down by losing his job in the lockdown.

Tony Cliff worked his way up from fuel pump attendant to becoming joint MD of The RRG Group. He worked 60-hour weeks and managed a staff of more than 800 people, travelling all over the country, as he had done for 34 years.

Now he’s been out of work for six months, is struggling with his mental health, is on medication and says he’s drinking too much. He signed up to Universal Credit for the first time in his working life last September.

The 51-year-old joined the car firm he worked for at 16, as soon as he’d left school. But in July 2020, the managing director was unexpectedly made redundant.

The rapid and dramatic change in his life ‘absolutely shattered’ Tony and he’s now on anti-depressants and sleeping medication to help him cope.

He said: “I’ve never applied for a job before or ever been in the job market. It was everything to me, my job, my social life, my friends and when you’re gone that all disappears. People avoid you because they’re faithful to their job.

“You go from having your phone going ringing every 20 minutes to nothing, your phone pinging with emails every two minutes to nothing.

“If you said to me 12 months ago that that would be me, I would have laughed in your face. I would have said I’ve got the most secure job in the world.

“It completely shattered me, I don’t know if I’m ready to go back into the job market. I just kept thinking what do I do, I’ve never been in a job centre in my life.”

Tony began drinking heavily to try and manage his situation and suffered “horrible nightmares”.

He also had to deal with the impact his job loss and mental health crisis had on his relationships – his partner moved out in January and they’re trying to piece things back together.

Tony applied for job seekers allowance in September 2020 and has since been assigned a work coach and a mental health worker to support him.

He said he considers himself a success story - he has weekly Zoom calls with a Department of Work and Pensions counsellor and regular calls with his work coach.

He said: “It’s not about the money at all, I am and have been in a very bad place. The antidepressants do make a difference, but I want to come off those eventually. I’m lucky, I have paid off my mortgage and have savings. It was about the support, the advice.

“I can’t imagine what it must be like for some of the people I knew who had massive mortgages, had bought a new car for their missus – there must be some dreadful situations out there.”

In Bolton, the number of Universal Credit claimants has increased from 8,710 to 15,720 during lockdown.

The job centre has hired thousands of new work coaches, now operating across Greater Manchester.