Mr Sadler and his family have spent the last decade living below the poverty line and things look bleak with inflation figures hitting 20-year highs.

"It's really frightening, I just hope I can continue," he said.

The ABS announced last week that the Consumer Price Index rose 2.1 per cent in the March 2022 quarter to an annual rate of 5.1 per cent, the largest increases since the introduction of the GST.

Staple items such as bread, milk and fruit and veg have all risen between 3 and 7 per cent over the past year and inflation is now handily outstripping wage growth, meaning many Australians are living week to week.

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Mr Sadler is an IT specialist, who rode the initial wave of the internet boom and was at one point earning "stupid money", with an annual salary of $170,000 plus super and bonuses.

But in 2011 things "all came crashing down" when a back injury - from his former life in the army - led to a period where he couldn't work.

"We lost absolutely everything and I just never got back from there. I was on the senior executive team of Australia's biggest ISP, but I've got my 1976 school certificate and nothing else," he said.

Fast forward 11 years and Mr Sadler, 61, and his family of four are now living in Wagga in search of cheaper living and a new start.

They've survived most of the last decade on Centrelink payments and now are on a weekly allowance of $577.40 a week in Austudy payments - Mr Sadler and wife Liz both attend Charles Sturt University in the hopes of retraining and gaining employment.

They pay close to $400 dollars a week in rent, which leaves very little for the family to buy food, let alone do any other activities that many take for granted.

Wagga St Vincent de Paul president Peter Burgess sees the toll of soaring living costs on a daily basis.

"We're finding that about 50 per cent of people that come to see us are living on between $500 and $1000 a fortnight," he said

"Roughly 80 per cent of people come in looking for food to top up because they haven't got the resources to put food on the table."

As the Sadlers complete their degrees over the next three years they will remain in poverty, something Mr Sadler describes as akin to having PTSD.

Mr Sadler and Mr Burgess believe the best thing a new government can do to help struggling families is to raise the rate of JobSeeker.

"You didn't die, the safety net stopped you from hitting the ground, but you're lying there with all your bones broken going 'how am I going to get up?'," Mr Sadler said.

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