HUNDREDS of people on the breadline in Morecambe had to struggle without their dole cheque for the second time in a row this week.

Harassed DSS staff - who have been inundated with complaints - blamed the Royal Mail for the problem.

One man who had not received his money said he had even been told that Royal Mail staff had misplaced bags full of giro cheques.

A spokesman for the Royal Mail denied that charge but admitted that there had been problems.

She said: "They are dispatched from Livingstone in Scotland and I understand there has been some sort of engineering problem there. We've brought in a contingency plan to sort it out. It is the cheques for the Morecambe area in your patch where there's been the problems."

But one man on benefits who asked not to be named was appalled. He said: "There's people who are on the breadline and desperately need that money. Once is fair enough but I've been told it's happening all the time because of the Royal Mail and it's personally happened to me three times.

The man complained: "That's just not good enough. The staff at the DSS are always very good and they just said 'once again it's the post office.' They should take as much care with those cheques as they do with any other mail.

"There's children who will be going without because they can't get their act together and this is not just a one off."

A spokesman for the DSS said: "All I can say to your readers is that if they have a problem they should go to their local benefits agency and they should be able to sort it out there." The post office spokesman reiterated that the problem was being sorted out.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.