Poor Kids

[NearlySpring]

Documentary on BBC1 now.

Sat here in tears watching this show following children living in poverty.

One woman, with 3 young girls all under 8. Her partner left her alone and she is struggling with money. The girls were given a sausage roll each for dinner. They are let out to play on a building site and derelict houses- where the he'll is the mother? Mother comes on saying how she can't cope financially- kids saying they have to miss meals as mummy can't always afford food. Next scene, mother has acrylic nails and a massive dog!

AIBU to ask if she can't afford to feed her kids basic cheap meals how the he'll does she feed a massive dog that is bigger than her 3 kids put together!

It must be terrible to be in that situation but surely you get your priorities straight. Who has a pet if they have no money?!!

Cooking from scratch. Padding meals out with lentils. Getting bills down via MSE. Turning things off at the plug. Turning the thermostat down. Using charity shops. Going on freecycle.

Hardly anyone I know has the skills to be properly thrifty. It seems to be a dying art in this country.

it's not really an art,it's something you have to do to just get bloody by.

I have just messaged Sams dad offering some of DS1's outgrown clothes.

There is an email address to contact the producers of the show who are passing on offers of help to the families involved.

Ok if you want to offer help to the families you can email here:

[email protected]

zuliecat working TVs also often on freecycle. For free.

Zukie - have you tried freecycle? i havent but my friend got a loveely sofa for zilch.

comewhine what would be helpful to offer I wonder? They obviously can't accept money.

I do think there is a problem nowadays that lots of people have a sense of entitlement to 'luxury' items such as flat screen tvs (since that's the item of contention here....). So if they can't afford them, they don't manage without - they borrow. I am lucky enough to have never been in that situation, but I wouldn't be buying an expensive tv if my income was so low I couldn't guarantee I could put food on the table.

My GPs always used to talk about how people nowadays complain about having no money - but still drive around in cars, have tvs, etc. But during/after the war, having no money really meant just that. So they really did make do, making their own clothes, wearing extra layers to keep warm rather than turning the heating (or fire in their case) on, growing their own veg, etc. Yes I know, yawn yawn etc...

I agree that thriftiness as a skill is dying out. DP looks at me as if I were gone out every time I turn off the lights when we leave a room, put a jumper on instead of turning up the heating, or try to repair a broken toy rather than replace it.

TBH, I think that in 30 years time everyone will have to be thrifty again because we as a society can't carry on consuming at the rate we do. No matter how you cut it, the human species burns many more calories of energy per day than the Sun shines onto us - and we can only get away with that for as long as fossil fuels last (which represent millenia of Sun energy locked up as oil/gas/coal). The only solutions are to be more efficient with our energy uses or to go nuclear, the one form of energy that is not ultimately derived from the Sun.

I'm really pleased to see from the FB page that the girls living in the damp flat in Glasgow have been re-housed. Excellent.

It looked to me like it was probably condensation and that all the people, in all the flats, in each of the tower blocks were likely to be affected in the same way. What will be done about that I wonder?

moomoo a telly might be considered a luxury item...but a cooker? Or a washing machine? And kids shoes? Beds? These are the sort of things people get into debt for you know.

do the tv's actually work now we have the digital switchover? think not unless ultra modern

useless looking at the flat in scotland the family had tried to make it nice with plants etc but fighting that level of damp is hopeless...the little girl was over the moon when they moved...the answer to all her prayers.

BTW MrsBethel, I would say I am 'thrifty'. My family have a good income, but that doesn't stop me putting on a jumper instead of turning up the heating; cooking meals from scratch (in bulk & freezing portions because I'm lazy); growing my own fruit & veg - and I regularly use charity shops.

We also have a tv which is about 15 years old so is very unfashionably un-flat. When it finally dies we will replace it.

Well I offered some of ds's hand me downs for Sam and I was going to send some books for Kay as you could see she loves reading in the docu.
Her dad messaged me back and said she did love reading and the offer was appreciated and then he passed on the email address.

True moomoo, but you don't know the circumstnces surrounding the tv and if it costs the same as other tv's to finance (dont assume its been pain for outright) then you would go for that one.

Tv models are something of a red herring in the wider scheme of poverty. imo, and I still dont see them as standard in the houses I go in where the occupants are in such dire straits.

As an aside, I think the saddest job I have heard of is the one where people are employed to go into houses to put locks on tv's so people can't use them as they have fallen behind in payments. The fella whose job this is was a bit vague on details when asked. So dont ask me anymore. But I just thought that was really sad.

I live in the high flats in Glasgow. :(
Fucking hate it, and I have 2 walking sticks so if the lift breaks down I am stuck inside!

I've used Gumtree a fair amount and have had 2 brilliant condition leather recliner sofas and a glass dining table! Also swapped a load of old stuff for a lovely modern electic fire with all the pebbles. :)

I dont know mine still works with a free view box.

Can't you get grants for essential items from the social?

moomoo I wish these skills were passed down the generations...certainly if you have a garden you can grow food, my parents certainly always did.
Ditto mending clothes etc...

I guess ost of us have become so comfortable we've lost these skills.

paid not pain. duh.

God well I will probably get flamed but I would do without the washing machine and hand wash if it meant I could feed my children. But I can't help thinking there's no need to. If I needed to get a washing machine, bed, or other furniture on a tiny budget right now I know a local organisation which sells items dirt cheap to people on benefits because I've donated stuff there myself. I also use freecycle so often see that kind of thing on there. Maybe people just don't realise those resources are out there? Or don't know how to use them?

Oh, I also offered to get some books for Sam, I don't know if he has a console or anything so didn't really know what to offer.
When I saw sam's trousers I kept thinking of the brand new pair that ds has but can't wear because of pockets on the back they have been sitting in his drawer for about 5 months :(.

thingumy it depends...you can ask for a loan but you might be refused and even if you're accepetd you have to pay it back.

I think that's one of the worst things about poverty: the least extra expense knocks you for six.