EEven before the endless Tory bans, there was a steady accumulation of words about poverty that were depressing because of their lack of honesty. What does “child poverty” refer to? Aren't all children poor? None of them do any work, just learn, eat, and ask for strangely expensive magazines. The only thing it can mean is being a child from a poor family – adult poverty. For that matter, what does “fuel poverty” mean? Is there a unique currency based on something other than the dollar that can be in short supply for reasons unrelated to the exchange of labor? If not, we are in fact experiencing “material poverty,” or In short, aren't we talking about “poverty”? Menstrual poverty, funeral poverty, clothing poverty, the endless fragmentation of needs, making what are actually very simple and far-reaching problems seem complex and diffuse.
However, it is only in the last 14 years that we have seen the classification of “bank” continue to expand, including food banks, baby banks, furniture banks, and pet food banks. Last year, one in five of his students had to use a food bank, which should definitely be enough for them to get their own classification, “Student Bank”. is. Anyone who remembers life with a social safety net will find it very disruptive and expect it to mean a £50 welcome deposit and their own checkbook. But the students themselves will understand. Cerys Evans, president of Lancaster University Students' Union, told the Question Time Committee last week that she had had people come to see her who had not eaten for three days.
Charities often initiate these categorizations, probably based on some sort of campaign principle that is difficult for people to relate to without details. Thinking about poverty means imagining what it's like to not be able to feed your children, or buy tampons, or go to the beach one day a year and buy an ice cream. much more difficult than. Either way, the details add humanity, or so that's the idea. When everyone does it, the effect is like reverse pointillism, a painting in which the difficulties collapse into dots of color.
The Trussell Trust was founded in 1997 and initially supported children living on the streets of Bulgaria. The company opened the UK's first food bank in Salisbury in 2000 and by 2011 his 100th food bank. From 2010 to 2011, the number of people they assisted jumped 50% from 40,000 to 60,000. Last year the Trussell Trust he delivered 3 million parcels, but of course they are no longer the only food bank in town.
Blue Cross pet food banks are relatively new (the first opened in Grimsby in 2022 after vets noticed an increase in the number of debilitated pets). Volunteers describe the food as “literally something you touch on a shelf and it comes out again.” The “multibank'' was invented in the same year by Gordon Brown, who described it as “a food bank, a clothing bank, a toiletry bank, a bedding bank, a baby bank, a hygiene bank and a furniture bank all rolled into one''. explained. And fortunately, he's getting to the heart of the real problem — no one can afford the things they need to stay alive — but he's glossing over the point a bit.When you can't buy toothpaste or When it comes to bedding, there's no need to wait for a one-stop shop. He was attacked at the time for a “band-aid” approach, which is unfair. We know from that time that if he had been prime minister, he would have done something more organized. was prime minister.
Nevertheless, every new practical solution to desperate suffering builds a society in which social reformer William Beveridge's “five great evils” (privation, disease, ignorance, filth, and laziness) are just realities. It feels like a new pillar of support. And doing a day's work for a day's pay is a lost relic of a bygone era, as rickets, or even starvation, ever were. That's what I will never forget and never forgive about the Tories of this century. They took practical, everyday generosity and kindness and used it to strengthen a cruel and universally unstable nation.
