A Green Recovery from the Pandemic Means Building an Economy That Works for Everyone.

 

Recovering from the economic impact of the pandemic means changing the way we work, moving away from old, polluting, industries and towards newer more sustainable ones.

 

The Green Party have called for a Green New Deal to transform the UK’s economy as we begin the road to recovery. This would involve work to make homes more energy efficient, the roll out of renewable energy schemes across the country and increased investment in public transport.

 

Green Party elected mayor candidate for West Yorkshire Andrew Cooper said, “We know that underpinning any economic recovery must be the aim to create a greener job sector which has sustainability at the heart of every process.”

 

Adding that, “However, the government is categorically failing to invest sufficiently in the Green sector”.

 

As they campaign for the 2021 local elections the Green Party are running on a manifesto that includes investing £2billion every year in training and apprenticeships to help people find jobs in green industries; retrofitting homes, businesses and public buildings across the country in a move away from new builds and using a carbon tax to fund the transition to renewable energy.

 

Training and skills would be prioritised in and investment directed towards those regions that were struggling economically before the pandemic and have suffered most since it began.

 

This would be assisted by giving local authorities greater powers to direct newly created training and skills programmes and to decide how related funding is spent. A network of regional mutual banks would also be created to start-up companies, particularly those run on a cooperative, community interest or not-for profit basis, that develop technologies to decarbonise the economy.

 

The party would also use a Universal Basic Income to tackle job insecurity, making it easier for people to train for new jobs or return to education and move from ownership to usership through initiatives such as car sharing and neighbourhood libraries for things like tools and equipment.

 

Green councillors have already played a key role in moving the UK economy to a more sustainable model, Andrew Cooper said: “Since our record results at the last local elections we have seen Green Party councillors up and down the country making real change in their communities. Whether it be motions to create thousands of jobs in retrofitting homes in Norwich, or my Green Building Fund proposal which will ensure all new builds are built to the highest specification with ultra-low energy demand, Greens know exactly what it takes to make sure we recover from this pandemic in a way that will offer a better future for all”.

 

 

Green Party activists in Staffordshire have been working to promote a green recovery ahead of the launch of their county council election campaign.

 

A party spokesperson said ‘building a green economy is hugely important to our members and supporters, many of whom run small enterprises in the creative or technology sectors and want to build their businesses in a sustainable and socially responsible way’

 

The spokesperson added that ‘the Green Party offers the only realistic and responsible plan for rebuilding our economy and society after the difficult and for many heart breaking times we have all been through’.

 

 

Describing the role party members have already played in transforming the economy of their area to make it more sustainable Andrew Cooper said “It is Green councillors and activists on the ground, working with local communities up and down the country, who are picking up the slack and doing what they can to ensure a green recovery for all.”

Protecting Parks from Development Will be Key to a Healthy Recovery for More Than Just the Economy.

 

After a year of being hefted to at best a short walk from our homes we have all come to realize that green spaces are key to our health and wellbeing.

 

In what acting mayor Councillor Wendy Simon described to the media as ‘a ground-breaking, forward-looking approach to protecting our green spaces’ Liverpool City Council have joined in partnership with Fields in Trust to preserve the city’s parks and green spaces for future generations.

 

Earlier this month the council cabinet voted to support a motion that will protect 100 green spaces, equivalent to 1000 hectares of land from development in perpetuity. This will initially apply to 20 sites in areas deemed in most need of having their green spaces protected due to deprivation and will then be extended across the city.

 

Acting Mayor Wendy Simon said in a press statement ‘Liverpool is blessed to have so many stunning green spaces, and this new initiative means we can ensure everyone has access to free, local, outdoor spaces for sport, play and recreation forever’.

 

In a city like Liverpool access to green spaces is linked to public health, residents have access to 25.3 square meters per individual, which is lower than the national average. In addition, 16% of residents have no access to a private garden compared to a national average of 12%. Previously only 4 hectares of the city’s parks were protected from development, now sites in all 30 wards will be protected, massively improving access. This is particularly important as the city’s population is predicted to grow by 10.3% over the next twenty years.

 

Liverpool, like many other cities in the North has been hit hard by the pandemic with infection rates higher than the national average and rising levels of reported stress and anxiety among residents corresponding to lockdown measures.

 

Mayor Simon said about the city’s parks that the ‘health and wellbeing benefits these locations deliver are priceless’, adding that ‘access to green spaces improves our neighborhoods, tackles climate change and supports economic growth’.

 

Speaking about the decision made by Liverpool Council Fields in Trust chair of trustees Jo Barnett said the city had made a ‘pioneering commitment’ to protect parks that are ‘valuable places where we can move, breathe, run and play’, adding that in a national context ‘we need to champion and support these precious spaces by protecting them for future generations to enjoy’.

 

The pandemic had, she said, caused us to realize ‘how valuable parks and green spaces are to our health and wellbeing, yet across the UK only 6% are protected from development and access to them is not always equitable’.

 

Hyperbole is the currency of press statements, particularly those emanating from local government, even the most timidly mundane decision ends up being recase at a great leap forwards when it passes through the press department. What Liverpool council has done is genuinely pioneering, meaning it involved thinking further ahead than the current political cycle.

 

Parks are hugely important component parts of the modern city, not just because trees are nicer to look at than concrete, though they unquestionably are. They provide corridors for nature squeezed by urban sprawl and help to clear the air of pollution; more importantly they make available to everyone, regardless of income or community, a little of the tranquility and leisure the wealthy have always taken for granted. In an ever more divided and fractious society where the fissures between classes are likely only to grow wider, that alone should make them a vital national resource.

 

Yet even though there is probably one on most of our doorsteps they are something we tend to ignore. This is something that struck me when I read Powering Up Stoke-on-Trent the glossy ‘brochure’ put out by the council in my hometown describing how we are going to leapfrog over our current troubles into a brave new world of productivity and prosperity.

 

It is packed full of infographics and photographs of young people operating bits of technology as council leaders and businesspeople look on approvingly mixed in with soft focus shots of the luxury hotel that was set to open in the city centre before the world slammed on the brakes. On one level it is a welcome change to see the council planning for a future where the phrase ‘managed decline’ has been cut from the lexicon, on another though you feel inclined to call for a large pinch of salt as you start reading. Similarly, optimistic plans have been put forward before, only to run into the sand sooner rather than later.

 

To be fair Powering Up Stoke-on-Trent sets out its case in a commendably even-handed way. Drawing attention to how, pre pandemic, the city had one of the fastest growing economies in the West Midlands with wage levels going up by 11.7% between 2015/18 and 8000 new jobs being created over the same period. At the same time, it does not shy away from the city’s problems, these include a higher-than-average number of people aged 16-64 who are economically inactive (29% of the population compared to a national average of 21.5%) and historically low levels of educational attainment, only 22% of local workers have qualifications above NVQ Level 4.

 

The ‘brochure’ offers a set of proposals for addressing the social and economic problems the city faces. These range from the grandly ambitious, creating a ‘silicon Stoke’ primed to tap into the green industrial revolution; to the resolutely practical, including improving the city’s notoriously poor transport system. Other plans have about them the dead hand of government targets and things that are ‘done’ to communities for their own good, including setting up a Health and Work scheme to tackle long term health related unemployment and making Stoke a Mental Health City, which seems to be a euphemism for yet another ‘integration’ of services.

 

All this is, no doubt, necessary; but unless you are going to be sipping cocktails in the Holiday Inn in some brighter future just around the corner, it all sounds a bit grim.

 

Surprisingly since the city council lists 87 sites officially designated as parks on its website the brochure does not mention any of them. More to the point it ignores their social utility, although it does list 14% of the local population being treated by their GP for anxiety or depression amongst the city’s health challenges.

 

Green spaces are inextricably linked to our wellbeing, the more access we have to them we have, the better we feel. Simples; as those annoying Russian meerkats say, so why can’ Stoke-on-Trent council seem to see it?

 

Perhaps its that parks are always there, the place just at the end of the street where we used to ride our bikes when we were kids, where we moped about as teenagers and probably where we will do so again as pensioners if we are spared. They are something we take for granted and as such we are always at risk of losing.

 

Where you or I might see a patch of green soaked in memories and associations a developer sees the perfect plot to build ‘executive’ homes, a council squeezed for funds before the pandemic and all but broke now might see a pot of gold. Resisting the imperative to know the price of everything and the value of nothing is what makes the decision taken by Liverpool council genuinely ‘pioneering’.

 

If they want their plans to ‘power up’ the city for a future that cannot stay on hold forever, then Stoke-on-Trent City Council must do the same.

 

 

 

 

 

The Shocking Death of Sarah Everard Highlights the Sickness in the Heart of Orthodox Masculinity that can No Longer be Ignored.

 

Even in a society that is often has a fascination with the darker areas of human nature that borders on the unhealthy some events cause genuine shock and, maybe, prompt self-reflection.

 

That has been the case with the abduction and murder of Sarah Everard, a crime that has exposed the grinding daily experience of harassment, abuse and all too often violence faced by women in the UK.

 

The 33year-old marketing executive disappeared near to Clapham Common in South London on a Monday evening in early March. Two days later remains found in woodland in Kent were identified as being those of MS Everard.

 

Wayne Couzins, a serving officer with the Metropolitan Police, has been charged with her murder. An unnamed woman arrested on suspicion of aiding him to conceal the crime has been released on bail.

 

The murder has prompted an outpouring of grief across the country with many women speaking out about the abuse they have faced and the attitudes they meet when seeking help from the authorities.

 

An example of this is the advice for young women to avoid going out after dark in the interests of safety issued by the Met. To which Green Party life peer Jenny Jones responded in a House of Lords debate by suggesting that an alternative approach could be to impose a six o'clock curfew on men. A comment that neatly exposed official hypocrisy and ignited a storm of protest on social media.

 

It is a cruel coincidence that the murder of Sarah Everard coincided with the annual parliamentary debate held in honour of International Women's Day.

 

This year Jess Phillips, who speaks for Labour on domestic violence, opened the debate by reading out the names of 118 women who have been murdered in cases where a man has been convicted or charged with the crime.  In her speech she went on to say that violence against women was 'a thing we've all just accepted as part of our daily lives'.

 

Responding to claims made earlier by Metropolitan Police Commissioner Cressida Dick that crimes such as the murder of Sarah Everard were rare Jess Phillips said 'killed women are not vanishingly rare. Killed women are common.

 

Statistics for violence and other crimes committed by men against women are truly horrifying.  Over the course of their lifetime 1in 4 women will experience domestic violence and 1in 5 will be sexually assaulted, 83% of these women will not report the crime to the police (source: The Home Office).

 

These figures relate to pre-Covid times, since the start of the pandemic things have got worse, between March and June last year there was a 7% rise in  reports of domestic violence made to the police, the number of incidents that actually took place will be much higher with many victims being afraid of unable to seek help (source: ONS).

 

Women's rights campaign group Reclaim These Streets announced plans to hold a vigil in memory of Sarah Everard on Clapham Common on Saturday evening, this was later cancelled due to concerns about a possible breach of Covid rules.

 

 An unofficial vigil did take place on Saturday evening and was broken up by the police. The resulting scenes of male police officers arresting, often with the use of force, female protesters were broadcast by news stations around the world.

 

Two hundred women and representatives of campaign groups signed letter highlighting how 'women are still at risk doing the most-simple of things', such as using public transport and calling for a 'firm commitment ' from the government to take action.

 

Responding to public concerns prime minister Boris Johnson told the BBC he was 'shocked and deeply saddened' by what had happened to Sarah Everard, adding that 'we must all work to find the answer to this horrifying crime'.

 

Also speaking to the BBC Labour leader Keir Starmer said the case must be a 'turning point' in how our society treats violence against women.

 

That something must change is all too clear, the untimely death of a young woman living a normal, quiet, life had shone an unforgiving light on things we always knew were there; but chose to ignore. For decades women have spoken up about a culture that turns a blind eye to casual sexual harassment and worse, only to be dismissed as hysterical or lying.

 

Now in this moment of shock and anger we know that not to be true and, as is the often the case we demand that something be done. There is a lot that can and should be done.

 

We need, for example, invest in funding women's refuges  and to end the disgraceful practice where when a woman has the courage to bring her abuser to court she is then doubly traumatized by being quizzed on the stand about whether her behaviour in some way provoked what happened.

 

To date successive governments have proved to be willing to say the right things about violence against women, but decidedly slow when it comes to acting. An example of this being the signing of the Istanbul Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence put forward by the  Council of Europe in 2011 by the Cameron government, a decade on it still hasn't been ratified by parliament.

 

If, as the prime minister says, we are going to 'find the answers to this horrifying crime ', then we, meaning men, will have to take a close look at ourselves.  As the letter written to the government by women's rights groups makes clear ' something has to change and it cannot be on women, the victims in this, to lead that change'.

 

What we need to look closely at is the culture of masculinity and whether in its current form it is fit for purpose in the twenty first century. On the evidence available that does not seem to be the case.

 

What it means to be a man  in modern Britain is based to a worryingly large extent on a tightly circumscribed set of attitudes and behaviours, such as not showing your emotions or asking for help, that men are conditioned to 'perform' from childhood. This creates what Paul Kievel of the Oakland Men's Project and others have termed as the 'man box', a harsh orthodoxy where fear and shame are used to police behaviour.

 

 

 

This has a damaging impact in the physical and emotional health of many men. Evidence of which can be seen in, for example in men being 14% more likely than women to develop cancer and 37% more likely to die if they do (source: Cancer Research). Men are three times more likely to commit suicide and report lower levels of life satisfaction (UK Government Wellbeing Survey/ The Mental Health Foundation).

 

The fact that many men feel boxed in by self-imposed expectations and attitudes is damaging for wider society too. Men are more likely to be victims perpetrate and be victims of violent crime, not least because they are also more likely to try and mask the feelings they have been taught are awkward and shameful through substance abuse (source: The Mental Health Foundation).

 

The tight squeeze of the 'man box' makes men reluctant to call out colleagues who say or do things that are inappropriate for fear of being ridiculed or thought not to be 'one of the lads'. As a result, toxic attitudes, towards women, people of colour, or anyone who just presents as even mildly 'different' are normalized along with a dangerously unjustified sense of entitlement.

 

Many men will have read the paragraphs above and told themselves that it does not apply to them, or to their friends. That is what we all say and what we like to think; it is a dangerously comforting fiction.

 

To prove the point try a little thought experiment, you're with friends in a pub and one of the group says something derogatory about a woman across the room, or implied that one of the other guys is somehow effeminate for being on soft drinks,  do you call him out? I know what I would most likely do; and it does not make me feel proud of either myself or my gender.

 

Sadly, fear that I would keep quiet and dismiss it as just 'banter', drink talking; anything really than some of the things it might be. Maybe my hypothetical friend is just blowing smoke, saying things he doesn't mean to try and fit in; then again maybe he means what he says and that masks darker intentions.

 

Being trapped in a choke hold by outdated cultural norms does not excuse male violence, either against women or other men. The harm it does to us, and others should be a spur to break free. Doing so will not be easy, it will require imagination and emotion courage. It will require something else too, time, a lot of time, more than is available in a political cycle where two weeks is seen as an eternity.

 

It will be made that much harder by the extent to which orthodox masculinity is embedded in our political, economic and social life. You can see its workings in the hostile takeover that costs thousands of people their jobs; in the political 'debate' that turns into a shouting match.

 

Most of all it can be seen in the awkward silenced when we know we should have said something; but too the easy option of staying quiet. Fault, we must realize, lies in what we did not do as much as what we did.

 

The murder of Sarah Everard is a crime that has shocked our nation to its core, that is right we should be shocked at such a waste of life, hope and innocence. It should  also be for men a moment for real change, a time to think difficult thoughts  and do difficult things; not because that will make us feel better, but because  they are the only real way to make sure this never happens again.

 

 

 

 

Newcastle Needs to Move to a Zero Waste Policy to Beat the Stink.

 

Over recent months the smell from a landfill site, described as being ‘like rotten eggs’ has become an issue of concern for people living in and around the Staffordshire town of Newcastle-under-Lyme.

 

The smell has been produced by a landfill site at Walley’s Quarry near to the village of Silverdale operated by Red Industries.

 

The site was opened for use as landfill in 2007 and with a permit to handle 250,000 tons of waste a year. This was controversially increased to 400,000 tons in late 2020, by which time residents nearby were already reporting problems.

 

In an article ‘Newcastle-under-Lyme A Very Bad Smell North Staffs Green Party member and local resident Steve Jones calls for the adoption of a ‘zero waste policy’ to address the problems caused by landfill.

 

Quoted in the article one local resident describes feeling ‘embarrassed’ at having to explain the origin of the bad smell to visitors and talks about neighbours moving away to escape it.

 

Steve Jones writes that ‘the health and living standards’ of Newcastle residents being severely impacted by the stink from the quarry.

 

He adds that ‘as a community and a country we need to go to zero waste as a matter of urgency; the health of people and the planet are relying on us’.

 

This, he concludes, will be difficult and may require some significant changes to how we live, but he believes that ‘together we can make change happen before it is too late’.

 

North Staffs Green Party have been actively supporting the campaign by residents for the quarry to be capped for over a year. In this time, they have had extensive communication with Red Industries and Newcastle MP Arron Bell.

Local party Coordinator Jade Green said that ‘Newcastle-under-Lyme council need to sort out their waste issue’, adding that Red Industries ‘cannot cut corners’ when it comes to capping the site.

 

The full article by Steve Jones can be read at https://northstaffsgreenparty.blogspot.com/2021/02/newcastle-under-lyme-very-bad-smell-by.html

 

 

 

Charities Warn of a Looming Rent Debt Crisis.

 

A coalition of UK housing and social justice charities have warned that increasing numbers of people living in rented accommodation are falling into arrears.

 

The Resolution Foundation estimate, in figures reported by the BBC, that 750,000 people fell behind with their rent in January, a rise of 450,000 on last year.

 

Research carried out by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) in November last year found that families in the UK owed £400 million in rent arrears and that two and a half million households were fearful about not being able to pay their rent.

 

The JRF have now joined with other charities, including Crisis, Citizens Advice, the Money Advice Trust and Shelter to call on Chancellor Rishi Sunak to take action as he prepares his budget.

 

In a joint statement they highlight the fact that people living in rented housing, particular in the private sector, often work in parts of the economy that are ‘struggling due to the impact of the pandemic and are being pushed into rent arrears with no support at a time of continued uncertainty’.

 

In their joint statement the charities welcome action taken by the government to help ‘sustain tenancies in the short-term’, adding though that they do not ‘go far enough to adequately protect renters going forward’.

 

The problems caused by people being unable to work or losing their jobs due to the pandemic are something the charities cite as a major issue. Despite furlough 7.8% of UK renters were unemployed in September, this situation my well become worse as the Bank of England predicts unemployment could rise by 7.75% by the middle of this year.

 

The charities call on the government to ‘do the right thing this budget’, adding that the ‘longer the Chancellor waits to take action, the more rent debts will increase’.

 

They have put forward three recommendations for areas in which they want to see action taken in the budget next week. These are supporting renters in hard hit parts of the economy to keep their jobs by extending the furlough scheme, tackling high levels of rent arrears by improving funding for measures such as Discretionary Housing Payments, and providing security for renters by extending he ban on evictions.

 

Evictions from private rented accommodation have been identified as a major driver of homelessness. At the start of the pandemic the government ordered a pause to evictions during the first lockdown.

 

This protection was watered down in September last year and the amount of arrears renters can build up before being at risk of eviction was lowered from nine months to six. The current ban on evictions comes to a end on 31^st March and 300,000 renters who took part in the research said their landlords had already spoken to them about eviction.

 

Responding to the statement a government spokesperson told the BBC on Friday that they had ‘put households at the heart of our decision making throughout the pandemic’ and pointed to the £280 billion package of measures to keep people in work.

 

There is no question Chancellor Rishi Sunak faces some hard choices as he prepares the budget. Government borrowing has leapt to levels unimaginable only a year ago due to the pandemic and he will be under pressure to balance the books.

 

Against this must be offset the huge impact Covid-19 has had on wider society, pitching millions of families into financial uncertainty, keeping a roof over their heads is just one of many struggles they face.

 

The message from the coalition of charities led by the JRF is clear though, on the looming rent debt crisis he must ‘act now to avoid renters being scarred by debts they have no hope of clearing and a wave of people having to leave their homes in the weeks and months to come’.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I Don't Want to be Crushed by the Dark Feeling that is Eating People Up.

 

'I am very scared of losing myself and becoming incapable, I don't want to be crushed by the dark feeling that is eating lots of people up'.

 

This is the stark description of what it feels like to be a young person in Britain as the country approaches the first anniversary of the beginning of the pandemic.

 

It was expressed to researchers carrying out ongoing work on the impact the pandemic is having on British teenagers for the Mental Health Foundation working in partnership with Swansea University, MQ Mental Health Research and Leaders Unlocked.

 

The latest report from the project, published at the end of January, shows that teenager's assessment of their own mental health has declined over the Autumn and Winter. In late Summer 10% said their mental health was 'poor'; asked again in November 16% gave a similar response.

 

The latest research shows that out of the 2395 young people aged between 13 and 19 who responded 27% said they felt nervous or anxious nearly every day in the week before being interviewed; 26% said stress had made it hard for them to do concentrate on school work and 32% reported having trouble sleeping.

 

Researchers found that economic factors have had an impact on the mental wellbeing of young people. Those in families where their parents or guardians were unemployed or on low incomes reported more problems than those from more affluent homes.

 

Professor Ann John who led the research for Swansea University said the pandemic had 'exposed the inequalities in our society', adding that the government 'needs to deliver targeted support to those most at risk of developing a mental health problems in the context of their economic circumstances '.

 

Catherine Seymour, head of research at the Mental Health Foundation said the findings were a 'warning about how painful many young people's lives have become during the pandemic '. She added that ' our concern is that the longer the pandemic goes on, the more embedded these problems will become'.

 

In a statement accompanying the launch of the report Mark Rowland, chief executive of the Mental Health Foundation said its findings 'add to the urgency of calls to protect young people and their families, preventing their distress from worsening'.

 

The Mental Health Foundation has previously released recommendations for what the government needs to do to address a potential mental health crisis caused by the pandemic.

 

These include creating a Mental Health Recovery and Response Plan that involves all areas of government and draws on successful approaches applied in other countries. They also call for more help for schools to support the mental health of young people and an end to benefits sanctions.

 

Data for the current report was gathered between November and December last year, the Mental Health Foundation has expressed serious concerns that when it gathers fresh evidence later this month, the situation may have become even worse.

This isn't just a school meals service for some kids it could be a lifeline.

 

Over the next few weeks councils across the UK will be setting their budget for the year to come. In these difficult times it is a glum business of counting beans and cutting costs. The public are 'consulted ', mostly for form's sake because belts have to be tightened come what may.

 

This process is talking place in my hometown of Stoke-on-Trent just now and the local press is drip feeding we the public with the bad news.

 

Reading through the resulting copy I came across a story that wasn't about what was going to be cut so much as what would be retained, at a price.

 

Under this year's budget proposals schools across the city will be charged an extra 6p for every meal provided for them by the City Catering service. A small rise that would raise an extra £140,000 next year, rising to £210,000 in 2022.

 

Speaking to the Sentinel Janine Bridges, council cabinet member for education told the  children and young people overview and scrutiny  committee this week, echoing a TV advert of a few years ago that 'the City Catering service is not just a school meals service, this is a top of the range schools food'.

 

A service that, she added, works with the Soil Association and 'endeavours to provide top of the range schools meals'. A far cry then from the boiled to death veg and meat of indeterminate origin familiar from my own school days then.

 

Here is the run though, as councillor Bridges told the committee to 'sustain this high-quality service, we must modernize some of the equipment, we must increase the of staff'. She added this added that she felt the children of our city deserve a quality school food service because for many, too many, children the  meal they get at school ' is the only good nutritious meal they're going to get'.

 

I agree, the question is if schools have to pay more for the meals they provide, for now much longer will they able to provide them? The Sentinel reported that 'council chiefs believe schools will be able to absorb these costs without passing them on to pupils who by school meals'.

 

That seems to be an overly optimistic view to say the least. In an education sector that has long since welcomed the market in a cost is something that exists only to be cut. The sharp operators will do so by moving to a cheaper supplier; the really sharp ones will find a way to raise the price in the process.

 

Either way families who are struggling to get by are going to get a raw deal. If schools move to a cheaper supplier their kids will get fed turkey Twizzlers; if the price goes up, they might not get fed at school at all.

 

Food poverty and poverty in general is a real problem and one that wrecks lives across the UK. There are, according to figures produced by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) 14.5million people living in poverty, 8% to 9% of whom stay there for longer than two years with a devastating impact on their life chances.

 

Out of those 8.4million struggle to put food on the table, 13% of the people in this sorry situation are in paid work. The Victorian nightmare of begin one of the working poor has become a reality again in the twenty first century (Sustain/ JRF).

 

Poverty is an awful thing for an adult to endure, impacting on their physical health and mental wellbeing; for a child it is even worse. The Child Poverty Action Group estimated that in 2018/19 4.2million children were living in poverty, 72% of whom were in families where at least one person was in work.

 

That pandemic has made what was an already bad situation so much worse, as the JRF put it it has battered the labour market. Many people have seen their jobs and incomes vanish, those lucky enough to be on furlough fear theirs may be next.

 

The impact can be seen in the fact that the Trussell Trust, the charity which runs most food banks in England gave out 1.2million emergency food parcels in the first six months, 2600 going to children every day.

 

This, you might say, is a long way from schools in Stoke having to pay more for the meals they serve, only it isn't. The kids with parents who can't afford a hike in dinner money are often the ones who received emergency food -parcels. Either that or they are walking the poverty line like a tightrope and may fall off at any moment.

 

It is an inevitably of budgeting that schools will pass costs on to parents, so the council need to think before passing costs on to them. Every child deserves a decent meal at least once a day, this seemingly small change could deny it to some. Pulling away a vital lifeline in the process.