Try not to mix your peas and mashed potatoes if you can help it. If you need Perl, use Perl. If you go down a pure Perl route, I'd explore more sophisticated modules than CGI.pm for the front end, such as HTML::Mason or Template::Toolkit.

If you go down the PHP route, make sure that you read the comments within the php.ini file for your installed version. Up till recently the default configuration was rather insecure.

()-()
 \"/
  `