Is there such a thing as "severe poverty" in the UK?

Absolutely slh

And dont forget rural poverty either- not so easy to count the differences on paper but we used to cover a rural area 9charity I worked for) and rural poverty is hard: you might not have the mass-estate issues but things like access to basic food supplies can be restricted, or very costly due to bus fares or the high prices charged by local stores.

And YY to it not just being people on benefits- what was the stat, 80% of people on HB are not unemployed: they are either pensioners, disabled, carers or low income earners. That's a very interesting stat IMO. An example of how soemne employed can get in a mess is my friend; just gone back to work following relaitonship breakdown, got a 0 hour contract. Works all she is offered (has a son, ex emigrated so no help there) but when she isn;t offered any hours benefits people can take months to organise her claim as it ends each time she has hours, leaving ehr icnome free for weeks. At one stage she was pretty much living out of my freezer which dad was stocking from the kindness of the owner of the factory dad works in!

The UK measures poverty using the Indices of Multiple Deprivation. Go to somewhere like Tower Hamlets or areas of Liverpool, which score highly, and you'll see significant deprivation. By significant, I mean people are being severely damaged by a lack of money and opportunity. Life expectancy falls by one year for every tube stop you make, travelling east from Westminster: 78 for men there, and 71 by the time you get to Canning Town, for example. There are places in Glasgow where life expectancy is in the 50s.

It might be worse in Haiti, but we have a moral obligation to do better here, given the immense resources we have as a nation - more than all bar 5 or 6 others, depending on how you measure it.

Am resisting chance to pul apart maypole's posts as well- DLA doesn;t cover food, or housing- just teh additional costs of a disability. So that would condemn anyone with a severe disability to death. Well I guess that'd cut the deficit then

I don't have a problem with people whose opinions I find horrible (as long as they stay away from my kids as these are often the ones with workhouse ideals) but wish people would get full facts in place before they present alternative plans. HR care for DLA is under £300 a month (not sure about mobility) and that isn't going to pay rent, food and the rest is it? So if you cannot work what? Cardboard box? Are there many that'd fit a wheelchair anyway?

So who supports the severely disabled kids if their parents cannot get carers allowance? Do you think there are queues of childminders wanting to take aggressive disbaled kids- indeed, would YOU want your child to attend provision with one?

LMAO as well that life is so easy that people always know if they can support kids. Listen, when we had ds4 I was studying at uni and doing really well with a clear idea of where I woudl work; dh had a great job in transport planning...... he was made redundant, 2 of the boys were diagnosed with disability and all the plans and securities we thought we had pissed off as quickly as you can blink. I am now studying an evening a week when DH can watch them and caring; DH is now retraining FT and working self employed- he makes a profit but we woudln't eat and cover bills on that alone. Not yet.

View from the pedastal must be nice, wish I could still see it!

Anyway.

I used to work with people who had absolute poverty in this country; but they ALWAYS had a complicating issue- MH disorders and avoiding proper help was most common, but you'd get famillies dealing with hideous accomodation costs- many housing contracts are fixed over a eyar and if you lose your income for whatever reason at the start there are no guarantees HB will cover more than a % or that if owned the hosue will seel quickly. Insurances are often not worth the apper theya re wirtten on- bosses vanish and refuse to sign forms through sheer meanness or depression when a comapny goes under or ceases trading. Friend's employer was sent to prison for several eyars; ahrdly going to sign a form was he?

But real poverty is rare in the UK; hardship isn't. Benefits are sufficient to live on if you have a LHA house or a rented place within LHA limits and no debt. If you don't though- common as well if someone has been working and redundant or become ill- hardship is genuine. We are atm in hardship; only temporarily because Dh gets student finance and a late Easter means grants and loans a month alter than normal. Until then I have one pair of damaged (paint stained) jeans and my placement outfit (doing a placement a day a week in term time to improve employability) to get by on. Killer? nope. Tough though. But as I am unwilling to make the call to cancel ds2's cubs (only respite he gets from disabled brothers) or school trips (free school trips are a made up thing IME) over it then it's how it is. Next year Dh has to find extra work contracts (graduates) and I have to either get a job or PGCE place and if not we will go under and land in full dependency: not looking forward to that pressure! And in a place like our city where there is 20% unemployment with the extra responsibiltiies / PITA factors (eg two sets of taxi times to be about for each day, and school meetings for what is beginning to look like 4 sets of SEN- ds2 has dyslexia so low level support and IEP reviews, ds4 is regressing, no of course I won't have any more and yes they were all born in ft employment!- it will be hard. We would move if it weren't for the complications of just getting special ed places after years of fighting for the right ones and being part way through transition: places for next eyar long booked up, boys woudln't have schools to go to.
We moved here from home to allow me to train for what we hoped would (and still might) be a better income though which proves we are far from some Tebbit-esque image of mobility refusal.

Life's complicated, AFAICS if you get through it with NT kids, a surviving aprtner and no long spells of redundancy you're pretty lucky. hard work won;t always save you- DH's job didn't end through financial harships, they just merged with another firm. Hard work might buy you an escape which is what we are banking on but if all support to do that was ended then nobody would stand a chance of recovering fro the blows that life seems to like throwing.

I stopped posting on MN because of the attitudes to some claimants but you know what? I am proud of us and how we keep going. Kids come first, they haven't a clue how we struggle at times- that matters to us. We get up each day and do things, DH puts in 20 hour days often with uni and his self employment and I often do all night and study and help out at school; our motto is 'forever forwards' and we are as far from the stereotypes of lazy benefit grabbing shirkers as it is possible to be, and I absolutely refuse to be lumped in with that bunch or feel bad about our lives. Between us we paid 35 years of NI before things went awry, and THIS is what they were for.

\link{http://www.unicef.org.uk/UNICEFs-Work/What-we-do/Issues-we-work-on/End-child-poverty\UNICEF also working in the UK on child poverty}

nah - must be a figment of our imaginations hey and it's just the workshy on benefits complaining they don't get enough

ahh sorry misunderstood you Fanjo - I was off on one and on a mission

Baroque, yes, I agree, but some posters were saying there isn't as people scrounge too much etc..

but that's the point Fanjo - we do have poverty in the UK!

Unless of course \link{http://www.oxfam.org.uk/oxfam_in_action/issues/poverty-in-the-uk.html\Oxfam}, \link{http://www.savethechildren.org.uk/en/united-kingdom.htm\Save the Children} and the likes are making it all up.

Lets not forget that these are charities that work in countries with absolute poverty - so they have a prettty good idea what poverty is.........yet they can recognise it exists in the UK - so why are so many people so willing to dismiss if the "big names" won't?

Comic Relief - that we've just had recently - also work in the UK......

Good post, Baroque.

glad you could fix your washing machine Baroque. i hear what you are saying.

Also food banks are being set up in towns because there are problems with people being hungry and not just people on benefits. i think in Tavistock in Devon there was a problem as the factories closed and it has a knock on effect on everyone.

I do think however that some people are careless with money and bring situations on themselves at times. i.e. wasting money on cigarettes or being snobby about 2nd hand clothes. I remember the 2nd hand uniform sale at the primary school where my children were and one boy being really rude about it and saying it was Oxfam. he was one of the children with a parent on benefits.

I was always very appreciative of hand me downs because although we were not on benefits (hubby earned too much on paper) we were hard up and my mum in law used to give us £100 a month to help. we had no money, a mortgage and 3 young children but things do change

Can't believe people are pitchfork waving about a lack of poverty tbh

If there isn't severe poverty here then surely that is a good thing, not an
indication that people have it too easy? ( oh Tory trolls)

Well said, Baroque.

you see the problem is - that your're assuming that it's only those on benefits who are living in poverty (and forgetting that many who recieve benefits are actually working), there are plenty of working families who live in poverty - often because they don't tick the right boxes (or are too ashamed/proud to claim).

I too have seen absolute poverty some of my exIL's live in it. It is shocking, but it doesn't make the relative poverty of the UK any less worse. Likewise my exIL's living in relative poverty in their own countries (far below the standards we would consider "acceptable" here) don't think they live in poverty, as there are others worse off than themselves in the same country.

Poverty is a very wide ranging term, and isn't just about money and material goods, it's about opportunity too, health, educatin and so much more.

My oldest exSIL (now living in the UK) has retrained since she came to the UK - to become a Family Support Worker - working with families in poverty - so obviously it's not quite so cut and dried.

I generally do ok on benefits, I get by, and because I budget extremely strictly (and exH took the debt with him so I came ont them with a totally clean shhet - a very very fortunate position indeed). However this morning I had a major panic on, my washing machine stopped working, There is no laundrette nearby (there is one the other side of town I believe) and it's expensive anyhow, and I have no means of getting there other than taxi. I couldn't afford a call out. Thankfully I have a good educatin behind me, and grew up in a family where aspiriation was encouraged, plus of course I've got internet access - so I was able to get online and find the information I needed to fix it myself.

The alternatives - laundrette and call out were out of the question - just not enough money to do that. If it had been a serious prblem that I couldn't fix (or couldn't be fixed!) I'd have been well and truly screwed.

The thing with those on low wages, and benefits who aren't so fortunate as I is that thse sorts of situations will arise regularly, the children's shoes will need replacing, the oven breaks, the light bulbs blow. They can't afford to put the heating on in their inadequate housing, mould grows, and health care issues arise,

Just because absolute poverty in the 3rd world is worse in terms of basic needs doesn't mean there aren't some similarities.

Too many people think that

Poverty=benefit
Poverty=purely a lack of cash.

If it were really that simple we should just be able to thrw cash at all the poverty stricken areas of the world and all would be hunky dory............

Another good video of the Ralph McTell song with an extra verse and pictures that tell the story

In December I came into contact through my work with a family of 4 who were sleeping in a park.

Fucking lucky bastards eh.

Threads like this make me want to throw something, I see the Tory trolls are out in force

Their basic message, I think, is fuck the poor, even the children.

What about an appeal for the homeless in this country? What about building cheap homes from the money collected? Why does it continue in the same way year after year, while fat cat bankers are knighted, count their bonuses and drink champagne?

What about the people in Okehampton relying on food parcels from charities to survive? There ar 60,000 in a similar situation in the country. Why is it only charities that are helping them? Where is the State? They have paid contributions over their working lives? Why are there no appeals on national TV for them? Why are they the "hidden hungry"? Is it because it would shame the country?

What about the woman who says

'I've been used to hard work and steady wages, but I haven't been paid since December and within weeks I was below the fuel poverty line (when a household has to spend more than 10 per cent of income to keep adequately warm).

The shock was terrible. For years, I've given to international aid charities and to suddenly be on the receiving end was very traumatic. But what really made me cry was the fact that people were helping. We'd felt so isolated, but now everyone was rallying round.'

All the publicity has flushed out the 'hidden hungry' ? struggling farmers previously too proud to ask for help; single parents who didn't know where to turn; low-income families hit by a one-off expense.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1369002/Rents-waived-food-parcels-How-Okehampton-Devon-pull-UK-recession.html#ixzz1HobElhUe

Yes there is 'severe poverty' in this country. Have you lived on benefits? Have you been into the home of someone who lives in poverty? Have you met anyone homeless?

What about the homeless who sleep rough in freezing condiitions, without a possession to their name? They are as poor as people in the third world.

The Ralph McTell song, 'Streets of London' gives a glimpse into that world

Have you seen the old man
In the closed-down market
Kicking up the paper
With his worn out shoes?
In his eyes you see no pride
Hand held loosely at his side
Yesterday's paper telling yesterday's news

Chorus: so how can you tell me you're lonely
And say for you that the sun don't shine?
Let me take you by the hand and lead you through the streets of london
I'll show you something to make you change your mind

Have you seen the old girl
Who walks the streets of london
Dirt in her hair and her clothes in rags?
She's no time for talking
She just keeps right on walking
Carrying her home in two carrier bags

Chorus

In the all night cafe
At a quarter past eleven
Same old man is sitting there on his own
Looking at the world
Over the rim of his tea-cup
Each tea lasts an hour
Then he wanders home alone

Chorus

Have you seen the old man
Outside the seaman's mission
Memory fading with the medal ribbons that he wears
In our winter city
The rain cries a little pity
For one more forgotten hero
And a world that doesn't care

I would say that having no legal source of income, no secure accommodation and no access to healthcare would be a fairly good definition of poverty. There are many people living in these conditions in the UK.