A GWENT clergyman says he feels "under siege" from people demanding money.

Canon Jeremy Winston, vicar of St Mary's Church, Abergavenny, said in an average month his door is knocked by up to 60 people looking for a cash handout - and he thinks it is often to feed drug and alcohol addictions.

He claimed turning down requests for money often leads to verbal abuse.

He said: "When I say I am not going to give them money they say I am not much of a vicar. I can cope with that but what concerns me is that for an increasing number of vicarages and families it's very unpleasant.

"We feel we are under siege. If we show any generosity then word gets around and more people come."

Canon Winston said: "I don't believe most of the stories I am told. I am not cynical but you learn to understand where these people are coming from."

The clergyman said he had offered food to the callers and directed them to where help and assistance was more readily available.

But he said: "At the end of the day they know somebody who is a priest or minister is going to have a conscience and it's not easy to turn them away."

In Monmouth, the Rev James Coutts also gets people asking for handouts - but only about a dozen or so each year.

Vicar of St Mary's Church for 18 years, he said: "My experience is that the type of people who call are different to the type of people who called ten or 12 years ago.

Then it was long-term alcoholics and tramps who came round. They tended to be middle-aged or old people.

"Now I get young people coming to me with very sophisticated excuses for money." Yet it is a different story in other parts of Gwent.

The Rev Jean Dane of Blackwood's Methodist Church said she could only remember being approached once in the three years she had been in the town.

She said: "I don't have a problem. In the time I have been here it has only happened once and that was because somebody was sent from the church to the vicarage."

In Pontypool, the Rev Graham Sawyer said although there was a lot of drug taking in the area, his door on Hanbury Road was rarely knocked for help by people with drink or drug problems.

He said: "I was a clergyman in the red light and prostitution district of Sydney and a lot of the people I dealt with were drug addicts and prostitutes with all sorts of addictions but they never asked me for money. It was the people with mental health problems.

"The same is happening in Pontypool. There's a lot of drug taking but people walking the streets of Pontypool with mental health problems ask me for money."

He said he had never been harassed and sometimes did give people asking for money a small amount: "I give them money because part of our role as clergy is to administer practical compassion."