Yesterday I went to the home of a pregnant woman & her family and they had NOTHING TO EAT ..... NOTHING. The only reason I knew this is because she broke down crying and when gently pushed she admitted the shame & fear she feels because she lives in poverty. The stigma of 1/5

poverty means she was too scared to tell me in case that meant she’d lose her child and unborn baby. We arranged an emergency food parcel for the weekend but hells bells what bloody draconian Victorian times are we living in! Poor people will be being marched off to 2/5

the workhouses next. Poverty is not a crime! Poverty does not mean she’s not a good mother! I cannot even imagine how scared she was to tell me. This is what happens when the right wing take control- slowly but surely the poor become perceived as victims of their own doing 3/5

where, as a society, we retreat into a psychology of the ‘deserving’ & ‘undeserving’ poor. This is not accidental. The right wing want this. Never ever believe the right wing believe in the welfare state - the insidious demonisation of the working class has been going on for 4/5

decades stripping us of our industry and work opportunities, turning us against each other, starving the welfare state....to the point where I, as a woman in a uniform represent somebody to be feared not a source of trust ...I went to bed last night very angry & very sad. 5/5