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I apologise. This is a long thread, but I feel it needs to be said. I& #39;ve read many shocking comments regarding free school meals for children. Some of the most ill-judged from @nickclarkeleave @fromwooton @CornerRadish. So here goes...
I found myself unemployed in March, the 1st time ever. I& #39;m a preschool teacher. Preschools were forced to close but initially couldn& #39;t use the furlough scheme because some children receive grants. So I was laid off, along with many others.
I have three teenage children, but not through choice, find myself a single parent. I had an old Huawei phone, a 14 Yr old car, a laptop, a TV, and lived in a small rented 3 bed home (the cheapest in the village). I think you& #39;ll agree that& #39;s hardly luxury.
I turned to Universal Credit for help. There were quite a few hoops to jump through to prove my situation, which is as it should be. And then a wait of 5 weeks to receive anything. Like all of you I believed it to be generous in the extreme.
The amount awarded to me was just sufficient to cover my rent and reduced council tax. I am hugely grateful for this. It kept a roof over our heads. But it did give me the problem of how to pay other costs. Let& #39;s start on food.
Apparently the commenters believe it& #39;s because we can& #39;t cook. I trained at Cordon Bleu school as a teenager, I& #39;m a very good cook. But it doesn& #39;t help if you can& #39;t afford the ingredients. The other oft quoted "grow your own" doesn& #39;t solve immediate demand. Now we need power.
Power is required to cook. It& #39;s also required to power the lights, laptops the kids use for their homeschooling, hot water, etc. One comment was just "shove a potato in a microwave for 8 minutes". So now we need to find a way to pay for food and power. What next? The phone....
"They should sell their iPhones". I don& #39;t have an iPhone, I might get £20 for my old Huawei. "Cancel the contract". Cancellation fees on my £9pm contract would have been 97% of the cost of the remaining 10 months. "Cancel Sky"..... We don& #39;t have it.....
"sell your handbags and pearls". I shit you not. That& #39;s one of the suggestions. My £5 primark handbag might raise 10p. Pearls? I have a toy set from my daughter& #39;s old dolls, maybe 5p. I suppose I could sell my wedding ring, but I promised my late husband I& #39;d always wear it.....
Sell my 14 Yr old car? Not much demand in a pandemic. It& #39;s also necessary when you live in a rural area. Without it I& #39;d never be able to work. That would be shortsighted. So can you see? I don& #39;t live the life of a rich person. Now I suddenly have nothing....
And none of it my fault. This is why there are hungry children. I did receive food vouchers over the summer holiday thanks to Marcus Rashford, and they were a life line. I& #39;m one of the lucky ones.....
I started a new teaching job in September. I& #39;m saddled with debt now because I had to borrow money to keep going for those 6 months. But some might not be finding it so easy to get work. Please have some compassion and abandon your hideous misconceptions......
We are not all lazy and undeserving. We don& #39;t have expensive things to sell. We had already cut our cloth accordingly. And above all, it was not the fault of our children. And one last thing. Thanks @RyanGunster for twitter support.
