Proof it pays more to go begging than to work: MATTHEW BELL spent the a day on the streets and found poor passers-by are more generous than the rich

After reports that a beggar in the West Midlands town of Wolverhampton was earning £300 to £500 a day, MATTHEW BELL, inset, decided to investigate if this was true. Surely not, he thought, in a town where the average salary is £18,500. 

Yet no sooner had he plonked myself down at 7.50am than he saw how it might be possible, with people of all walks of life, shown left, bottom right and top right, stopping to help. 

He wanted to find out if the reports were true: could he actually make hundreds of pounds, or would it be a humiliating struggle to scrape a few pence?