Yvette Farrell, volunteer director for Dean Forest Kitchen, which cook fresh meals every day and delivers them to clients within the Forest of Dean, said they might have to increase prices as there’s “not going to be much choice in the future”.

She said: “It’s impacted us a lot because we work on a not-for-profit scenario so there is not a lot of wiggle room when it comes to increase in any expenses.

“So the cost of fuel is really, really hitting the business hard and we’re having to do our best to still keep going to our clients who are spread across a very rural area with no public transport.

“But we have to take these meals to them because… they will not have somebody coming to see them during the day because they’re so isolated.”

Tristan Holland, company director at TLC Support Service, manages a small team of community care workers who travel around Wotton-under-Edge and Dursley.

Staff use their own vehicles and the company pays mileage at 55p per business mile.

He said: “We had an increase in our fees back at the start of the year, just kind of taking into account all the extras that were coming in this year but even that does make it tight.

“Everything has risen – the cost of the fuel, the training, even the uniforms that we purchased.

“Everything has gone up and so we try to keep our services as affordable as we possibly can but there has to be a profit or else we just can’t carry on going.”