Thread- I’ve interviewed countless families as part of research into family eating in social and economic deprivation. The vitriol thrown at them this week is https://abs.twimg.com/emoji/v2/... draggable="false" alt="💔" title="Gebrochenes Herz" aria-label="Emoji: Gebrochenes Herz"> Mothers told me of time spent walking to specific supermarkets because the needed item is a few pence cheaper there

and calculating their shopping to the exact penny, avoiding aisles and people so they don’t get distracted and loose count, because the worst thing that can happen is to be caught short at the checkout in front of a queue of strangers.

Hiding smart price tins under branded goods to avoid the shame and judgement from shoppers around them. Of the abjection they feel at putting poor quality food in front of their children but spending that extra pound for better sausages means not eating something else.

Eating the leftovers off their kids plates makes a meal if you fill it out with bread. Their teenage sons told me that if they don’t have breakfast they’re not as hungry at lunchtime so it doesn’t hurt as much to miss it and wait for dinner. That ‘cuppas’ help keep them full.

Fathers have told me that they regularly sit on the stairs at night outside their kids rooms, contemplating suicide because they have lost their jobs and they’re “worth nothing” because they can’t feed their kids.

If our only concern in this is who’s to blame, feeling vindicated that “we” have done “better” and justified because people get what they deserve- then we are the problem. #ENDCHILDFOODPOVERTY