Is This Poverty?

I sent the Charity Children in Need the following email  you can see below the reply

I have just seen an advert with Paul O'Grady can you tell me if the children were actors

Martin Clarke

Dear Martin,

Thank you for your email.

I can confirm that the children you see in the advert with Paul O’Grady are actors. However, the stories are real and are based on findings of a report we published in 2012 called ‘It Shouldn’t Happen Here’

With best wishes,

You should emphasise these are actors the impression is that they real characters I will look at the link as I and many other do not believe the authenticity of the ad. You have taken a snap shot and not given the full reason why these children are going hungry

Martin Clarke

I have read this document with great interest. Below is a couple of statements from the report, heart rendering you have to admit, YET IS IT TRUE? Has anyone taken the time to actually check out all the accusations?  I doubt it, anyone can make up a story to suit their ideology.

The test of poverty is the following as described on their web site “A family with two adults and two children under 13 needs to have £317 a week, after paying for housing to be above the poverty line.”  Now in the South you can rent a three-bedroom house from £650 pcm to £800 pcm. So if we take the £650 pcm as a benchmark that means the Poverty mark is set at  £467 per week before Tax and NI? That equates to a family earning over £30,000 a year before Tax and we are to believe that is POVERTY? These Charities need to start checking their figures before making outlandish statements.

The Government needs to investigate these claims and investigate these charities I wonder what there directors are paid and what percentages goes on the organisation admin costs are?

One thing I do agree we should insist that all are paid the living wage as the minimum wage, which is £7.45p, yet I think £10 an hour would be, a more acceptable minimum wage. Before you all say we can not afford that you must ask the question how much Government help is given to the low paid? It seem a considerable amount of Tax payers money is given to support people on low incomes by doing this you keep wages low and so making profits higher for large companies. If you increase the minimum wage you would ease the tax burden because people would not need so much Taxpayer handouts. Yes prices would increase but eventually tax could come down for those on low paid jobs because they would no longer be a burden on the Taxpayer. This would allow them more money in their pocket.

The recent recession and all the cutbacks have hit me

hard. My bank account is never in the pluses, always in

the minuses, so that is a constant struggle in itself. I’ve

cut back to the bare bones and still the government

wants to cut more. My son misses out on some school

trips, which I just can’t afford. Sometimes I go without

a meal so that my son can eat.”

Low-income paren

“A year or so ago, we literally relied on any money we

raised at car boot sales to pay for food for the week.

Some weeks weren’t too bad, others were dire. The

British weather decided how we lived that week (when

it rained, the turnout at car boot sales fell).