More than a million have used UK food banks in the past year

[Barrel of Fun]

I went to a food bank and they didn't have any poached salmon or fresh dill. I'll not be using them again.

 

[Nibble]

Right, a question for you.

Which of these items is it OK to spend money on before expecting someone else to feed you and your kids?

1 Smoking
2 Sky TV
3 Mobile phones
4 Sophisticated computers
5 Big screen TVs
6 Alcohol
7 New (not second hand) furniture
8 Designer clothes
9 Foreign holidays
10 Cars
11 Play stations and games

Further to my last, you should do some research. It's a common misconception that lots of people have these things. Seriously, there are some families and individuals in the UK that are ridiculously poor. Some people that have not got the capacity to follow up calls, forms, pay bills etc. They are just not mentally capable of it and they have been denied benefit and slipped through the Tory net. Seriously, this is happening right now.

 

[BigGully]

There will always be recipients of free stuff if offered.

I had an experience last year when my wifes office seemed full of free hampers and they were trying to work out how and who might be the worthy beneficiaries.

A quick scroll down the free school lunches register seemed to offer some help and that was how it was executed and although her school has a tough demographic none could really pick out a hunger crisis within their school community.

You see its dysfunctionality and or neglect which is the real problem, not poverty or lack of funds or access to services, those children at risk already had a full belly, other circumstances had blighted their lives.

Somehow I was roped into the distribution process and off I went delivering my food hampers, squeezing past their newer cars then mine, living standards that seemed to surpass their status of crisis families that needed a food hand out, it all seemed a little odd.

On my return the organising charity seemed particularly chuffed with themselves, ok fairplay, but they were fulfilling a role really not needed.

It seems that many more are doing the same.

 

[Nibble]

There will always be recipients of free stuff if offered.

I had an experience last year when my wifes office seemed full of free hampers and they were trying to work out how and who might be the worthy beneficiaries.

A quick scroll down the free school lunches register seemed to offer some help and that was how it was executed and although her school has a tough demographic none could really pick out a hunger crisis within their school community.

You see its dysfunctionality and or neglect which is the real problem, not poverty or lack of funds or access to services, those children at risk already had a full belly, other circumstances had blighted their lives.

Somehow I was roped into the distribution process and off I went delivering my food hampers, squeezing past their newer cars then mine, living standards that seemed to surpass their status of crisis families that needed a food hand out, it all seemed a little odd.

On my return the organising charity seemed particularly chuffed with themselves, ok fairplay, but they were fulfilling a role really not needed.

It seems that many more are doing the same.

Well, if you decide to hand out free stuff on the basis of the school dinners register you will see that. Some kids eat school meals not because their folks don't have the money but because their parents don't have the wherewithal to scrape a healthy lunch together.

Of course some scallywags cheat the system. All systems get cheated. So what to do? Scrap the welfare system? Shove the poor back in the workhouse to spread TB about the UK again? Debtor's prison?

It's people like Uncle C that would have this country sent back to Victorian times. However the hard knuckles of poverty can come a knocking on anyone's doors these days, be interesting to see how these right wingers would act if it were their daughters having to beg for food or selling their minges for pot noodles.

 

[BLOCK F]

Clearly,food banks do provide a very useful service for those who ,for a variety of reasons,find themselves short of readies and unable to feed themselves or their families.
However,I do have a bit of a problem in believing that real poverty in this country is any worse now than it was in difficult times during previous decades.Should such a network of food banks have existed in those times ,I dare say they wouldn't have been short of clients whatever party was in power.

 

[Uncle C]

However the hard knuckles of poverty can come a knocking on anyone's doors these days, be interesting to see how these right wingers would act if it were their daughters having to beg for food or selling their minges for pot noodles.

Bit of a drama queen aren't we? Perhaps you can tell us how many of that 1 million free hand outs were resorting to this.

 

[BigGully]

Well, if you decide to hand out free stuff on the basis of the school dinners register you will see that. Some kids eat school meals not because their folks don't have the money but because their parents don't have the wherewithal to scrape a healthy lunch together.

Of course some scallywags cheat the system. All systems get cheated. So what to do? Scrap the welfare system? Shove the poor back in the workhouse to spread TB about the UK again? Debtor's prison?

It's people like Uncle C that would have this country sent back to Victorian times. However the hard knuckles of poverty can come a knocking on anyone's doors these days, be interesting to see how these right wingers would act if it were their daughters having to beg for food or selling their minges for pot noodles.

Nibble, my point was the validity of the need for food banks and the million people that we are told to have used them.

Poverty isnt the problem, its dysfunctionality and neglect, the most vulnerable children that my wife has to deal with are not necessarily financially poor and rarely physically hungry, there are far more complex problems within some families.

I accept that if these banks encourage some to eat whereas previously they wouldnt then fine, but I cannot accept that our benefit system doesnt adequately cover peoples food.

 

[somerset]

Further to my last, you should do some research. It's a common misconception that lots of people have these things. Seriously, there are some families and individuals in the UK that are ridiculously poor. Some people that have not got the capacity to follow up calls, forms, pay bills etc. They are just not mentally capable of it and they have been denied benefit and slipped through the Tory net. Seriously, this is happening right now.

....and these exceptions only happen when Labour are not in power, .. I see where you are coming from now, however its not a place I fancy going myself.

PS: ... and how common a misconception does it have to be, to actually be true?

 

[Westdene Seagull]

How about them cutting this cloth
1 Smoking
2 Sky TV
3 Mobile phones
4 Sophisticated computers
5 Big screen TVs
6 Alcohol
7 New (not second hand) furniture
8 Designer clothes
9 Foreign holidays
10 Cars
11 Play stations and games

Fair bit to work on there.

Very simple to say but not taking into consideration that a majority of those items may well have been purchased while someone was still in work. Only because they have them when they are out of work doesn't mean they are not cutting their cloth accordingly.

 

[BLOCK F]

Well, if you decide to hand out free stuff on the basis of the school dinners register you will see that. Some kids eat school meals not because their folks don't have the money but because their parents don't have the wherewithal to scrape a healthy lunch together.

Of course some scallywags cheat the system. All systems get cheated. So what to do? Scrap the welfare system? Shove the poor back in the workhouse to spread TB about the UK again? Debtor's prison?

It's people like Uncle C that would have this country sent back to Victorian times. However the hard knuckles of poverty can come a knocking on anyone's doors these days, be interesting to see how these right wingers would act if it were their daughters having to beg for food or selling their minges for pot noodles.

Blimey,the thought of minges and pot noodles conjures up a few interesting images!

 

[Uncle C]

Very simple to say but not taking into consideration that a majority of those items may well have been purchased while someone was still in work. Only because they have them when they are out of work doesn't mean they are not cutting their cloth accordingly.

Anything can be sold to buy food.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

be interesting to see how these right wingers would act if it were their daughters ....selling their minges for pot noodles.

I'd prefer to keep my pot noddle given the choice of this or a tory minge.

 

[Westdene Seagull]

Anything can be sold to buy food.

Good grief - how much do you think a second hand tv or Playstation is worth ? I'm currently out of work - should I be ripping all my kids electronic gadgets from their rooms for sale ? Where exactly am I meant to sell a Wii ?

 

[Nibble]

Bit of a drama queen aren't we? Perhaps you can tell us how many of that 1 million free hand outs were resorting to this.

17.

 

[BigGully]

Good grief - how much do you think a second hand tv or Playstation is worth ? I'm currently out of work - should I be ripping all my kids electronic gadgets from their rooms for sale ? Where exactly am I meant to sell a Wii ?

If your children were going hungry, then yes, but I suspect that they eat well, which really answers the original point.

 

[Nibble]

....and these exceptions only happen when Labour are not in power, .. I see where you are coming from now, however its not a place I fancy going myself.

PS: ... and how common a misconception does it have to be, to actually be true?

Of course these cases occurred under Labour. But they were the exception. The Conservatives are deliberately identifying these people and taking their benefits away rather than helping them. While they go chasing after physically and mentally incapable people so they can appear to be getting people off benefits the real cheats are laughing and watching 60" tellyboxes with a pack of B&H and a mercedes parked in the drive.

 

[Uncle C]

the real cheats are laughing and watching 60" tellyboxes with a pack of B&H and a mercedes parked in the drive.

Thanks, that just about proves my point.

 

[Nibble]

Thanks, that just about proves my point.

 

[BigGully]

There is so much wealth in the world that NOBODY should be in poverty. To think that around 14% of BRITAIN is below the poverty line in 2014 is outrageous.

The questions that everyone should be asking are, why is wealth so disproportionately distributed? Why are the richer getting richer, and the poor getting poorer? Who exactly are our politicians serving??

...but the most important question of all is, what can we do to fix it?

I suspect our poltics are different, but this is a serious question.

Could you offer an example of a person in poverty in Britain 2014.

Working/not working, any benefits to include housing, free health care, prescriptions, school dinners, dental, etc etc.

I fully accept some are better off than others and sometimes that disparity seems unwarranted, but not sure when poverty is so glibbly mentioned as 14% of our population, when we are so aware of the excruciating poverty that many experience in other parts of the world.

It lacks a bit of credibility to me.

 

[Uncle C]

There is so much wealth in the world that NOBODY should be in poverty. To think that around 14% of BRITAIN is below the poverty line in 2014 is outrageous.

The questions that everyone should be asking are, why is wealth so disproportionately distributed? Why are the richer getting richer, and the poor getting poorer? Who exactly are our politicians serving??

...but the most important question of all is, what can we do to fix it?

Well what are you doing?