Hungry kids and shitty views

[icequeen34]

I apologise as I'm sure there are already threads on this topic. But I feel so so sad and angry today, not only about Marcus Rashfords campaign to feed hungry kids over the holidays being rejected. But some of the horrible views and justifications being spouted - mainly the old 'lazy parents need to take responsibility for feeding their kids' remark. Some utter twat was saying poor families should grow their own food because 'it's not hard' and another Tory MP claimed the blame lies with absent parents (as if his leader isn't one of those).

These are terrible comments from privileged people who clearly don't understand the lack of time, money, outdoor space and education needed to grow your own or shop more savvy. But even in the cases of the worst most lazy parents, why can't people see that the children shouldn't be the ones to suffer? It really boils my blood especially when MPs get so much in terms of expenses for food.

Sorry for the rant I just feel very disappointed and upset today.

Absolutely no child should go hungry and whilst there is a need Free Meals and Food Banks etc should continue. However I feel they are just a ‘sticking plaster’ and don’t fix the problem. I would love to see a government tackle the problems of 1) high living costs and low wages and 2) making the benefits system a safety net and not a trap that once you are in it is impossible to get out of. So many people are born into poverty and there is no way out and it is so unfair.

@KnobblyWand

There aren't loads of them about, but my parents were those stereotypical, feckless, lazy, neglectful arseholes you read about in those comments. Spent more money on fags and bingo than they did on feeding and clothing us, and that's no exaggeration.

But it wasn't our fault. We were blameless. And we were hungry. Most days, our free school meals were our main meal. By the end of the summer holidays we were skin and bone.

I can't get over the callousness of these arseholes who are gleefully admitting they'll happily punish children for their parents' mistakes. But then it won't come as a surprise to these kids, nobody gives a shit about them anyway, just like nobody gave a shit about me and my siblings.

This absolutely breaks my heart.

How any parent can willingly let their children suffer like that is unimaginable.

Poverty is real folks. Children in poverty is even more real.

In normal circumstances, blaming absent parents who don't pay for their children is normally the first port of call and rightly so, however at the moment a lot of these children will also be from 2 parent families who have lost their jobs due to the pandemic and simply have no money.

Food is the fundamental necessity of life and to say 'I'm not paying because some one else can't look after their own kids' either doesn't have children, or has no ability to place themselves in others shoes.

You are happy to pay for the NHS to look after other people when you aren't using it, why not the same with hungry children??

Are there any countries that feed all kids at school?

Maybe we should just do that. Have breakfast and lunch at school for everyone. If they did it properly they could make it healthy and balanced.

I went through periods of being on free school meals when Mum wasnt working and I adored it. Having a properly cooked hot meal was amazing.

I was always so disappointed when she had a job and didnt qualify as it meant she couldn't afford the meals. And my packed lunches were cheap and basic often just a cheese sandwich with the mould cut off if we'd had it too long.

Things were so much worse when she was working as she had more costs. I do agree that a forced child maintenance system is needed.

My mum refused to try and claim anything due to past domestic violence and worrying that it would mean contact being an option and him having our address. But even the basic 5 pounds a week would've made a difference.

@ancientgran
Some vouchers never get spent because the parents either cannot be bothered or simply cannot get to the shops they can be used in (but the retailers still get paid for the vouchers that aren't used), and others are exchanged for alcohol or tobacco (probably below face value) in dodgy newsagents who then use the vouchers for their own food. This ignores those who use the vouchers on the food that they would already have bought and the money that they would have otherwise spent on food on other things and those who use the money to feed themselves rather than their children.
Even when directly providing the food in a state that isn't ready to eat also assumes the parents have the ability and willingness to prepare the food into meals which unfortunately isn't always the case and that it will be the children who eat it which isn't always the case (some may trade the food for other goods or eat it themselves).

I made the stupid mistake of reading the Daily Mail comments. I naively thought there would be some morsel of empathy, but no.
Comments were thoroughly depressing, such as: "well they shouldn't have kids" to "well I feed my own kids so my priority is that they don't go hungry".

FFS where's the humanity?

I just find the lack of understanding about food poverty to be startling from certain classes.

"Its lazy parenting" - do people believe that most children affected by food poverty have parents who seriously cannot be bothered to feed them?!

"There's no excuse for sending children to school without breakfast" - I agree, if only it were simple. But what about the reasons?!

"People could grow their own food or forage" - really? What about people in urban areas with no garden etc?

The list is endless. And all the comments seem to be so shallow and misunderstood.

My hear goes out to kids stuck in this situation.

The way I see this issue is that if any child is going to bed hungry then there is a problem which needs addressing. Parents may be poor, feckless, unable to care, negligent or whatever it really doesn’t matter. No child should go to bed hungry and the state needs to step in and do something.

We can only judge ourselves civilised by the way we treat the weakest in society and at the moment we are letting them all down badly. This government is despicable.

@eatsleepread

See, I'm torn on this. I saw something on social media the other day, about breakfasts for school children who wouldn't get one. This got me thinking. No matter how you try and justify it, any parent who sends their child to school on an empty stomach is feckless. Porridge is cheap to make, and value cereal and bread are very inexpensive too. If you're the sort of parent who doesn't provide breakfast, then you're cutting other parental corners too, and I don't mean only financially. This won't be a popular view but I stand by it. 100%. There is no excuse for sending your child hungry to school in the mornings.

Although I do agree with you that we should be responsible for feeding our own children, in normal circumstances, the circumstances are anything but normal at the moment.

A huge number of families will be struggling financially, with employers going out of business left, right and centre. Children will be dependent now, more, than ever, on free lunches at school. I do think that something should be done to support struggling parents through this pandemic.

I think part of the problem is lack of education. A mother who was brought up in poverty with no breakfast, may not think its a priority to send her own children to school with a full stomach. Kids being hungry does impact on their concentration and therefore their education. Ultimately it’s the children who suffer.

I've not read all posts here, apologies if this has already been said

Please check with your local food bank and all covid support groups. Government funding has stopped, is under discussion apparently. But we all continue to do what we can. If you can give some time, money or foodstuffs it would be gratefully received. All areas, all groups have different needs. Facebook is a good place to start.

Thank you, in anticipation

I think we should be focusing on the problem and contacting our individual MPs, applying pressure rather than just concentrating on the gratuitously ignorant and stupid comments on DM or anywhere really, they're just an unhelpful and pointless distraction from actually doing something useful.

I've written to my MP who wasn't on 'that list'. Any of us/all of us could do that.

@Handsoffisback

I think whatever the opinion is about parenting, the children should never ever be punished. As I said on a previous thread, I lived on an estate half my life where many many people didn’t/don’t work, get benefits and prioritise tattoos, false nails and other crap over feeding their children properly. Believe me it does happen, I have lived amongst people like this. My own aunt and uncle had their children removed for neglect. My cousins were never fed properly (I’m talking bag of chips from the chippy to last 4 kids a whole weekend), yet my uncle always had money for tattoos and the pub. I don’t think it’s all Dickensian style ‘no money for gas, living on gruel’ type stories. As with everything it’s a mixture. My own experiences lead me to think a voucher style system for food would be a good option in supporting families that cannot feed their children. That way the money cannot be spent on alcohol and cigarettes. If you are someone though that thinks the simple answer is ‘well the kids are the parents responsibility’ Then you need to take a good hard look at yourself. There are some really really poor parents out there that are trying their bloody hardest, but there are also some totally shite parents that don’t feed their kids properly. Does that mean we should punish the second group of children for the sins of the parent?

I’m sorry you had a tough time. Having worked in safeguarding for thirty years, I saw regularly what you described, ie parents prioritising their own needs (false nails, tattoos, the pub etc) above the needs of their children.

I was criticised and accused of reading the daily fail (I don’t by the way). I think people genuinely don’t believe that those kinds of parents exist. Unfortunately they do, as you’ve eloquently described.

I think your voucher scheme would be a viable solution. No child should be suffering and going hungry because their parents are inept/selfish/incapable etc.

Parents experiencing poverty aren't making good choices. It's not about porridge.

@june2007

Luncheon meat comes in a can it does not need a fridge.

It needs refrigeration once open.

No money to feed hungry kids but somehow there would have been money for this kind of waste.

www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/cars/article-8863603/Government-slammed-proposed-7m-Highways-England-rebrand.html

I don’t like the vouchers because it’s easy to abuse. My neighbour had her children removed. School where still sending the vouchers, she was selling that at 50% value to buy crack. I know because she offered to sell them to me and openly admits she’s on crack.

No child should be hungry but a parent who regularly cannot feed their child needs more help that a voucher chucked their way, they need help to find/keep jobs, meal planning etc.

I've written to my Tory mp, for whatever good it will do. I'm on the edge of my seat awaiting the inevitable identikit reply.

I have a perfect place to grow tomatoes- a sheltered, south-facing terrace that gets sun nearly as long as it's possible to get sun every day. We also had a hot ,sunny summer (at least for the UK) and I'm an experienced and knowledgeable gardener so I know what kind of plants to buy, how and when to prune them, etc. So let's ignore the nice planters I bought and pretend that I just grew my tomatoes straight in the growbags this year - even then, by the time I bought eight plants, a bottle of fertiliser, and some decent soil, I'd spent about £60, and all in all I ended up with maybe 2 kilograms of tomatoes, tops. So let's do the math- £30 per kilogram. I don't really like raw tomatoes so I saved them all in the freezer as they ripened and I made sauce with them last week. I'm now the proud owner of three jars of passata which cost me £20 each, if I ignore the value of my own time and labour.

So, dickheads of twitter, please do tell us again how the poor should grow their own fucking food to save money.

there are parents around who do not prioritise their children and there are parents in genuine need . So how do you tackle that ?

I know someone ( this is true ) who was turned away from food banks as she visited too often and they knew her benefits should have been adequate ( she was buying drugs) she has had her child taken away from her now .

So can someone explain how the vouchers were used during the holidays ? Were they just used in supermarkets ?

@Handsoffisback

Thank you jennifer. I’ve given that viewpoint on here before and been accused of lying which really hurt. I know a family of 6 children who would be shut in a bedroom on a Friday and Saturday night from 6pm until the early hours while their shit parents spent all the benefits at the pub. They were given a biscuit each, no tea. Middle class mumsnet needs to wake up. A lot of people are reckless with money. I don’t care what people say on here, it happens, I’ve lived it.

But nobody is saying that. They’re saying that the government refusing to help hungry children because of their parents is absolutely ridiculous.

My mum set up and ran (until recently when she retired at 74!) an after school club every Tuesday from her church hall - it was a fun craft/play session for kids, tea for parents AND a hot meal for everyone - she regularly got 50+ people

it ran 3 days a week in summer hold and during Covid provided packed lunches - no stigma and also able to driect families on for more support/food banks etc

There are people suggesting that our kids are fed with stuff they probably wouldn't give their dog - seriously time for a change