BATTERED BRITONS BRACE FOR A BLEAK CHRISTMAS AS HUNGER HAUNTS MILLIONS
By SHAMLAL PURI
Associate Publisher & Senior Editor – UK
Worth Noting:
- One scrooge who was shamed in the vigilant British media was a traffic warden in the British city of Worcester when he issued a £60 Fixed Penalty notice to a fuming volunteer dressed in a Santa Claus outfit who had parked his ‘sleigh’ a converted three-wheeler bike for allegedly driving in a “traffic-free” zone.
- The Santa, Mick Worrall, was distributing sweets and teddies to children and collecting donations for a children’s charity when the traffic warden descended on him.
- Mr Worrall refused to take the penalty notice, telling the traffic warden to send it directly to his home address in the North Pole where he lived!
- He vowed not to pay that fine as the traffic warden had failed to understand the Christmas spirit. He said that he would appear in Court dressed as Father Christmas.
A seven-year-old British schoolboy in the Midlands city of Coventry stole bread from his school. When questioned, the boy burst out crying, saying he wanted to eat the bread at home because there was no food there.
This harrowing story was narrated to a hushed and shocked House of Commons by Labour MP for Coventry South Zarah Sultana as she presented her Free School Meal Bill to the Parliament.
Ms Sultana said parents and teachers had described shocking accounts, including the seven-year-old boy who was forced to steal food.
Another boy burst into tears at school because there was no food to eat at home.
The UK is going through an unprecedented emergency: Hunger. It is devastating many lives, and there is a serious danger that families may be forced to abandon their young children if they cannot feed them.
There are millions of heart-wrenching stories of children just like those of two boys, but which never get told or acknowledged that they haven’t had a decent meal all day. They are forced to steal food to get by.
In recent months desperate thieves have broken into banks – not banks with people’s money but food banks to steal food to feed their families.
Frightened supermarkets are now putting security tags on cheese, in an unprecedented move to stop shoppers pilfering blocks of this dairy product.
Christmas is not likely to be any better for such poverty-stricken families already struggling for survival in the current cost-of-living crisis.
Their heart-breaking dilemma is – do they heat their homes in this bitter winter when the country was under a blanket of snow in recent days to pay their energy bills or spend money to buy food?
Critics point out that some big corporations and the Tory Government can be counted among Scrooges.
Who is Scrooge?Scrooge, the principal character from A Christmas Carol, is the best-known.
Ebenezer Scrooge is the character in Charles Dickens’s 1843 novella A Christmas Carol as a cold-hearted miser who hates Christmas.
In the real world, scrooge is selfish and doesn’t like giving or spending money. Scrooges keep a tight hold on every penny, even if they’re rich.
You can also call scrooge a miser or a skinflint.
In the United Kingdom of 2022, we have scrooges too.
One scrooge who was shamed in the vigilant British media was a traffic warden in the British city of Worcester when he issued a £60 Fixed Penalty notice to a fuming volunteer dressed in a Santa Claus outfit who had parked his ‘sleigh’ a converted three-wheeler bike for allegedly driving in a “traffic-free” zone.
The Santa, Mick Worrall, was distributing sweets and teddies to children and collecting donations for a children’s charity when the traffic warden descended on him.
Mr Worrall refused to take the penalty notice, telling the traffic warden to send it directly to his home address in the North Pole where he lived!
He vowed not to pay that fine as the traffic warden had failed to understand the Christmas spirit. He said that he would appear in Court dressed as Father Christmas.
The ruckus between him and the traffic warden attracted a small crowd. Sympathetic onlookers took a whip around and collected the £60 to pay his fine, but Mr Worrall insisted that the local council, responsible for traffic fines, should scrap the parking ticket.
There are many heart-rending accounts of injustice meted out to the children of the United Kingdom as the country struggles with Child poverty.
The scale of poverty in the UK was evident several months before the Yuletide season set in.
The Trussell Trust, an NGO and charity working to end the need for food banks in the United Kingdom, recently revealed that over the last six months – April to September- they had distributed 1.3 million emergency food parcels to people this year in crisis visiting food banks.
Almost half a million of these went to children.
That’s a third more than was provided during the same period in 2021 and an increase of more than 50% compared to pre-pandemic levels.
The Trussell Trust, which supports more than 1,300 food bank centres, says the cost-of-living emergency has created a ‘tsunami of need’ as people struggle to survive amidst the soaring living costs.
With need outstripping donations for the first time in its history, the charity has been forced to launch an emergency appeal to ensure that food banks can meet the alarming level of need in their communities.
In the first half of this financial year alone, the Trussell Trust’s food bank network provided more parcels than in 12 months five years ago, when 1.2 million emergency food parcels were distributed.
Over the last six months, 320,000 people have been forced to turn to a food bank in the Trussell Trust network for the first time, representing a 40% increase compared to 2021.
The charity warns that food banks are at ‘breaking point’, both physically and mentally, and are set to face the hardest winter yet as they expect to provide more than 7,000 emergency food parcels a day on average in the next six months.
Josie Barlow, food bank manager at Bradford Foodbank, said: “Someone who came to the food bank recently told me that ‘buying milk is a luxury now’. So many people are struggling with bills and food prices. We are fortunate to be able to help people, and we work hard to support them in both the short and long term, but we are also facing challenges.
“We have seen a huge increase in people coming to the food bank in the last two months compared to the same period last year, and our stock levels are very low for this time of the year.”
The Trust, which runs 1,400 food banks throughout the country, says its food supplies from big-hearted donors are drying up.
The way the hunger situation is deteriorating, there is a need for more to be set up.
Over the last six months, some 320,000 people have been forced to turn to food banks in the Trussell Trust network for the first time,
One in five people referred to food banks by the Trussell network is in working households.
The charity has urged the Government to take immediate action as food banks were reaching a breaking point.
Volunteers are set for the business winter as food needs outstrip donations from the public.
Over the last few years, the charity’s network of food banks has seen how the proper support, at the right time, can help people out of hardship.
Most recently, the Government’s targeted support to people on the lowest incomes via July’s Cost of Living Payment correlated with a small dip in need at food banks but that does not appear to be enough.
However, the charity warns that short-term interventions are neither sustainable for the Government nor dignified for struggling people. They don’t solve the longer-term problem of people having to rely on food banks.
Emma Revie, chief executive at the Trussell Trust, said: “These new statistics show that, even in summer months, people are struggling to afford the essentials, and we are expecting that this winter will be the hardest yet for food banks and the people they support. This is not right.
“We know that with the right support and a stable and sufficient income, people don’t need to turn to food banks for support.
Over the last few years, the Government has acted to protect people who are struggling, and this action has made a difference. They must now work again: with swift support to help people through the winter and the vision for the longer term to ensure that social security is always enough to weather challenging times.
“We are calling for the Prime Minister to act decisively We urge the UK government to realise their commitment to supporting people on the lowest income with a broad package of support. As well as ensuring that benefits rise with inflation as soon as possible, this must go further to close the gap between price rises and incomes over the winter.”
Thousands of homes in the United Kingdom will be missing Christmas cheer again, losing its fizz this year as the country battles through a major crisis caused by internal politics and external forces.
Christmas is one such occasion that is close to the hearts of the United Kingdom’s predominantly Christian community and, of course, the diaspora from other religions who join in the festive fun to mark not only the birth of Jesus Christ but also to revel in the atmosphere of celebrations, joy and pleasure of this grand occasion where families get together.
But in many homes, there will be no Christmas candles; no bottles of bubbly will pop, sending the fizz flying around joyous family members who have got together to celebrate.
Those who work miles away from home travel for their Christmas holidays from the countryside to the cities of London, Edinburgh, Scotland, Belfast, Ireland and Cardiff, Wales but the current wave of rail strikes involving more than 40,000 members of the powerful RMT Union have paralysed rail journeys and ruined their travel plans.
A total of 14 rail network companies, includingLNER, Northern trains, Avanti West Coast, South-eastern, Cross Country, Chiltern Railways, Greater Anglia, Govia Thameslink (plus Gatwick Express), London Underground, West Midlands Trains (plus London North-western Railway), Great Western Railway, TransPennine Express are demanding a pay rise and better working conditions.
These travellers have paid jobs and can take a flight to the nearest airport to their homes, but there is chaos there too. Ground handlers at several main airports have also downed their tools and refuse to work.
And please do not even fall ill – Ambulance crews are on strike, and so are some 100,000 nurses working for the National Health Service.
Instead of celebrating Christmas with their families striking members of the Rail Union RMT, Border Force, and Royal Mail will be standing out on pickets and will be spending their time standing on pickets while their loved ones will be waiting for them at home.
The level of hunger in many British homes and their helplessness. It has been left to the individuals and some generous sections of the private sector with a heart of gold to come to the succour of the suffering.
Big-hearted Britons and some organisations, including supermarket chains like Tesco and Morrisons, have gone the extra mile to try and help poorer families by donating food to help needy families.
People in the British diaspora are also doing their bit to bring a smile to children.
Hundreds of toys are heading to children who would otherwise go without this Christmas, thanks to the Sikh Toy Appeal in the southern England city of Southampton.
Toy appeal volunteers were at the Southampton’s Sikh Resource Centre in the last few weeks to collect toys or leave them at two drop-off points in the city.
Minal Thaker, a Toy Appeal committee member, helping to raise funds, donations and awareness of the charity so that children from deprived backgrounds or who are in hospital can open a present on the big day.
She said: “Many of us are looking forward to Christmas, but there are some families who will have nothing. We’re trying to ensure that as many as possible receive something for their children.”
The Morrisons supermarket chain is giving away free Christmas vegetables to help feed children.
They are handing out carrots at the chain’s 498 stores nationwide as part of their festive celebrations.
To make it attractive for children who haven’t taken a shine to vegetables, the supermarket chain has called its free carrots giveaway campaign Carrots to Feed Santa Claus’ reindeer, who, as the story says, love carrots as their staple food. The ads say Farmer Christmas to deliver the healthy reindeer snack to the shops.
The fun in this giveaway is that the carrots will be wonky (crooked in shape rather than straight).
The idea behind the giveaway is to use millions of tons of vegetables thrown away or ploughed back into the farm because they are misshapen, and people would not buy them.
The supermarket chain says it wants to help its customers.
Another supermarket chain, Tesco, also gives away free carrots to its customers.
Just a few days before former Prime Minister Liz Truss resigned, a delegation of food bank representatives went to 10 Downing Street and handed over a petition signed by 3,000 food bank staff and volunteers to Truss, calling on her for urgent action to end the need for emergency food.
Food banks have worked alongside the Independent Food Aid Network and Feeding Britain. They collectively called on the former Prime Minister to use her powers to ensure everyone has enough income to afford life’s essentials.
Steph Maxwell, Uttlesford Food Bank Coordinator, said on that occasion: “The impact of the cost-of-living crisis is being most keenly felt by people on the lowest incomes, forced to live from day to day, never having sufficient funds to bulk buy or take advantage of discounts. It costs more to be poor.
“As well as skipping meals, not switching the heating on, and not buying school uniforms to replace outgrown ones, many families have no option but to turn to a charity to make ends meet.
“It cannot be right that the poorest people in our society are being pushed deeper into poverty because of an inadequate social security system that does not reflect the true cost of living.
“Our food bank continues to be busier year on year, and unless benefits are kept in line with the true cost of living, we anticipate a sharp increase over the coming months. I hope Liz Truss will show some compassion and ensure that the benefits system is sufficient for people to buy their essentials and to live with dignity.”
Flora Schweighofer, Southwark Food Bank Community Engagement Officer, who was part of the hand-in at Downing Street, said: “It is vital to create change. I am worried that more and more people will not be able to afford the essentials and therefore need to use a food bank or other form of charitable food aid for the first time.
“I am especially concerned about the situation facing people who are already struggling, whose income did not reach far enough, even before this dramatic rise in the cost of everyday life. I am worried about how this will affect the mental and physical health of many people in our community.”
Soon after that, Liz Truss resigned as the Prime Minister leaving the petition in the in-tray of her successor Rishi Sunak to deliver on that.
Sunak has been away in Bosnia to meet the British troops stationed there and was seen serving food to the soldiers in that country. Little is known if anything has come out of the Government’s response to the petition.
The future is bleak. Trussell Trust estimates that over two million people claiming Universal Credit skipped meals to keep up with other essential costs in the previous three months.
This is based on a calculation by the Trussell Trust multiplying the following: a. 40% of people claiming Universal Credit said that they had ‘needed to skip meals to keep up with other essential costs in the last three months.
The total number of people in the United Kingdom claiming Universal Credit in July 2022 was 5,670,824.
Figures from Stat-Xplore and the Department for Communities in Northern Ireland showed that in Northern Ireland in February 2022, 132,090 people were claiming Universal Credit.
This brings us to the moot question: Can Sunak turn the tide and play Santa to heal their bruises and bring a Christmas cheer to the suffering?
For Now, it seems highly unlikely. In his own words, spoken on 24 October when he took over as the Prime Minister – we should be ready to face tough times.
Prospects for a Tory win in the next General election? It seems that, too, is unlikely, as we see now. Perhaps, as munpredictable as the next snowfall in London.