Is anyone else watching the 'on the breadline' programme ??

[MrsMorgan]

Why is that whenever they feature a lone parent in a programme like this, they always have to have loads of kids, messy houses and generally look and behave excatly how most people percieve lone parents to be ??

It is so annoying.

[BobbingForPeachys]

Agree with Colditz.

It'snot necessarily financial poverty- plenty of people on budgets esp. these days- it's poverty of expectation, hope and choice. Infinitely harder to shift.

[Nancy66]

I noticed the sheets thing too - didn't surprise me though. A games console is always going to be more important than things like bed linen or a picture for the wall.

[colditz]

Actually they are about the same in charity shops.

I don't know why the lack of sheets. Perhaps the particular people in that programme don't consider sheets to be an integral part of the bed making process.

It's a funny thing, poverty.

Imagine if you were raised in poverty, as one of five, by a depressed parent.

Sheets on the bed would not be a priority, so you were raised without sheets.

You now do not believe sheets to be necessary and have been presented with no evidence to the contrary. Ditto your siblings.

Then you and all 4 on of your siblings have 3 children each. That is now 16 people with no faith in sheets.

And until someone you respect turns up, sees your sheetless bed, and says "You should have sheets, this is where you buy them, this is why, let me show you how to put them on, change them once a week" - your bed will remain sheetless for no other reason than that sheets have not occurred to you.

Ditto your siblings and their children.

[colditz]

Well, when you have precious little to offer your children, you want to give them a little something to boast about.

If music lessons, holidays and riding are simply never going to happen, a ten year old is hardly going to go to school and say "YEah but we have pictures on the wall and sheets on the bed" is he?

No, he's going to go to school and say "yeah, but I've got a DS."

[Kathyis12feethighandbites]

I am sure you are right Colditz. But I am shocked at the thought that there are people (how many people? how exceptional are these families?) who have missed out on something so basic.
I can understand why you would buy a playstation/cigarettes rather than sheets if they were expensive, but at that price it has to be to do with, as you say, just not seeing them as essential....

[colditz]

It's because they don't see it as a basic. Youc an still sleep on a bed and be warm and comfortable without sheets, ergo sheets arenot a necessary. Cigarettes are fueled by an addiction, ergo they are necessary. Playstations are fuelled by nagging and complaining children, ergo are necessary.

Nobody feels a NEED for those sheets.

[indiewitch]

I also wondered about the lack of sheets.
I also despaired of the lack of work ethic amongst the young people. Is it that benefits pay them too much do you think? I didn't see any of the celebs saying the money was running out, although it was only days 1 and 2 yesterday.

[silverfrog]

we were poor when i was younger.

real, not enough money for food poor.

we lived in crappy accomodation (temporary housing), with virtually no white goods. we had a cooker, when it worked, but no fridge (did have one, but it broke and couldn't replace it) and no washing machine.

we had a stint with no sheets (although it would have killed my mother to admit it to anyone) because we could not wash them.

it cost far too much at the launderette, and we did initially wash them in the bath, but then had

a) nowhere to dry them (we had no heating, and it would take days in an already damp (think mould growing all over ceiling/walls) house to dry them, and

b) not enough sheets as they were all wet.

so sometimes it is not about sheets not ocurring (although i can see how that situation would arise) - it really is about not being able to see a way around the problems that are currently facing you.

I do agree about all the money wasted on drink/cigerettes etc though.

my mum was a smoker a that point, and she gave up - simple as really. her choice was to smoke and have us all hungrier than we already were, or give up and at least try to have basic nutrition covered (and I really do mean basic - we usually had one meal a day, and a bit of toast as well if we were lucky)

later on, when we were a bit better off, she did re-start smoking, but for about 2 years she had one cigerette a day - she would really look forward to her cigerette just before she went to bed, it was her only pleasure for a long while.

[colditz]

I think the army is the very very best place for him.

He's cannon fodder now. he can barely string a sentence and if he doesn't get into the army he's looking at a life of crime, grime, no reason or rhyme, and an early death caused by poverty of aspiration.

He could make something of himself in the army. He will have a firm place in army society, he will have some sort of hope of bettering himself. It's probably his best shot. It's possibly his only shot.

[mosschops30]

Oh god I have just started watching this as I sky+ it. I dont think I can carry on watching tbh!

I can understand people experience hardship, that people are left in shitty housing in shitty circumstances etc.

BUT - why do these people not clean, the houses were DIRTY! Like many have said on here, a bit of fairy liquid costs next to nothing and even a bottle of domestos is only £1. Dirty plates left in bedrooms, writing on the walls. Who allows their children to behave like this?
Money to gamble/drink/smoke - something that I dont have despite me and dh earning decent wages.
And the amount of kids!!!! WTF!!!! Surelt these women werent previously married to doctors or lawyers and thought theyd always be able to provide for 6 children. Me and dh are pushing the boat out having three, and although Id love to continue having babies, we just couldnt afford it, so why do these people continue to breed indefinately.

I am dumbfounded

[BobbingForPeachys]

Indie nope, I don't think it is that we pay too much in benefits- the lady on the gambling amchines received DLA and pension (so no implication that she never worked, or anyting- DLA is not means tested, it is needs tested but universal).

Dropping benefits will worsen things, people will turn increasingly to crime (hence all the panic about at the start of the recession RE possible rie in crime rates) and it will decimate the opportunities people do have- if you are going to haul your arse out, and people do that every day, then it costs money to get to college to do your GCSEs, for equipment etc- even if the course is free. Likeise bus fayres to the greengrocers or school for aprenbts evenings- not everyone who is poorives in the inner city after all, a trip from our village (big estate) to the nearest greegrocers if £3 IIRC on the bus.

It's far deeper than that, it is hereditary a colditz said and a lot of it is to do with a fragmented society- a whole underclass who has no experience of being in a working family, who may have well been raised by a single parent and who quite often is living in private rented acocmodation that really does enforce the idea that these peopleare lesser beings, homes suited for animals not people.

We used to have a WC and a MC; now we have a WC and under class which is defined mainly by aspiration- anybody can be on benefiots after all, esp. in the current climate. The WC want to work, if they can, but the UC doesn't really know anything of the vculture of work, personal gain and generally success at anything.

The benefits to work thing- I like it in priinciple but

1. there'd be a knock on effect on jobs if employers can get people in for free training

1. you'd have to ensure that the people on the schemes got the same rights as people in conventional jobs- time off for TPL etc.

1. a large percentage of people would be a waste of space anyway- no time keeping skills, education etc

1. people shouldnt have to work for below minimum wage, that would need sorting

Sort that and I would say yes

[Marioandluigi]

I sky+ this and have just watched it and to be honest I agree with alot of you about the cleanliness of the houses - full ashtrays and dirty dishes everywhere.

I also grew up in poverty, but my mum had pride, and we were always well behaved and respectful. My mum was depressed but we would never have written all over the walls, especially things like 'I hate everybody in the world'

I think it was a very sad programme

[Stayingscarygirl]

I think that depression has a large part to play in the state of the houses, to be honest. I suffer from depression, and I struggle to cope with keeping the house cleanish and tidyish - luckily dh does help. I can only imagine how soul-destroying and depressing it can be to live in the circumstances we saw on the programme, with little hope of a better life for yourself or your family.

Under those circumstances I can honestly understand how things can slide, and once a house is that messy, tackling it becomes a huge and nigh impossible task, especially if you are ground down by your life.

[MakemineaGandT]

I can't get this programme out of my head having watched it last night - I found it so sad and depressing. I just want to shake these idiots by the shoulders and tell them to sort it out for the sake of their children. The more I think about it, I think it's not (only) about money - it is about attitude. Taking responsibility for yourself, pride in what you do and wanting to get the most out of life. I just think it's sad that those children will probably end up just the same.

It reminds me of a friend I had at school when I was nine. She was from a rough council estate but was a lovely girl and very bright, despite little encouragement from her parents. I remember being invited round for tea after school one day and being absolutely horrified by what I saw there - it is all very vivid in my mind today: house filthy, parents chain smoking and shouting, no sheets on the beds, walls upstairs crawling with mysterious bugs, sheets of wallpaper hanging off the walls, utter rubbish for "tea" and just complete chaos with masses of siblings/noise/mess. I went home and cried for her. Eventually she got pregnant and had a baby at 15 and as far as I know is still living that way. So, another life wasted - she really was very bright and could have DONE something with her life, but I guess the awful way in which she was brought up meant she didn't have the drive or skills to do it. I still feel sad thinking of her.

[Stayingscarygirl]

As I said, Makemine - that kind of resolution to change and sort yourself out is very difficult indeed if you are depressed, as I suspect these people are. I know I'd be depressed, in their shoes.

[MakemineaGandT]

yes, me too scarygirl.

[Jacaqueen]

ITV 9pm last night.

I would like to know just how many people in this country live in conditions like that.

Wife Swap, Secret Millionaire, How The Other Half Live and loads of other real life type programmes all seem to feature people living in squalor.

[CarGirl]

Jacaqueen that was the point that Keith (?) allen was making, there are huge numbers living like that in this country.

Having suffered from long term severe depression in the past I can really understand why these people have given up.

Aspire to what & why, what would it achieve etc etc etc you just can't think like that when you are depressed and see no hope in the future.

[BobbingForPeachys]

Can I just point outt hat whilst many do live like that, most people on benefits do not- I grew up ion an estate, and worked on one later on, and have ever only come across two houses in that state- one belonging to a single aprent on benefits (with severe depression and a CPN in the mix), and one belonging to a professional couple.

[mosschops30]

Depression is an illness, its not feeling sorry for yourself because your life is shit.
Saying that this is the reason for the way they are is an insult to people who genuinely suffer from depression.

You have to take some responsibility instead of blaming everything youre going through on something or someone else!

[CarGirl]

But circumstances can cause you to be depressed. Inagine what it is like to have been brought up in that environment, chances are you are going to replicate it as Colditz said you're not going to think wow I@m going to be so different.

Also it can be cultural to not move away to look for work etc.

The programme makers will have found the most deprived areas for them to go to it's certainly not representative of all "poor", "deprived" areas but it is represensitive of some.

I have a friend who works with older teenagers in the NE there is one town that is so insular they will generally not consider travelling outside of it to get work. So we're now talking that many of them are 3rd & 4th generation of not working because there is no money or work in that town.

[BobbingForPeachys]

Yes MC youa re right, there is a massive difference

But people whoa re depressed are more likely to end up in this situatioon, and depression runs in famillies; lack of motivation is a genuine symptom of that.

It's not just depression- plenty of low leverl SN in non working famillies for example, and other psychiatirc illnesses- either you'remore at risk if you haven't got work, or you are mroe likely to not get a job or lose it becuase of it. I don'tmean full on disability- but the borderline stuff that goes just above the help level in education.

And of course even if you don't have these issues- maybe your aprents did so you missed school to care, or your parents just didn't give a shit about school.

So many ways to get down that far, very few ways back up again- it takes a certain drive to do so,and many people simply do not have it.