This is utterly shameful

No rush?

I am trying to find the article, I think it said the money comes from the aid budget, but as per a lot of news it needs to be verified, will look again later (sorry have to cook dinner)

GrannyGravy13

UK gives UNICEF 100 million pounds annually, I am trying to find the article.

I thought it was a charitable organisation?

You beat me to it, Nezumi65. A man with personal wealth of over 100 million doesn't want UNICEF giving money to impoverished UK children.

I have no words.

Well Rees-Mogg is complaining about unicef doing this. He sounds more out of touch every time he opens his mouth.

UK gives UNICEF 100 million pounds annually, I am trying to find the article.

Whenever foreign aid is mentioned there are numerous posts about countries where there are millionaires and a lot of corruption and how they should look after their own poor. Would anyone like to comment about this country needing aid and the corrupt/venal/self rewarding government we have here? Maybe the poor are always with us, but accepting that some have so much and others so little is simply not civilised.

I suppose the answer is that UNICEF feeds all hungry children wherever they are. But they will need to receive funding to so do, so where is the funding to come from? Ourselves instead of giving to overseas aid?

Whitewavemark2

It takes a certain kind of person who being aware of the hunger children are feeling in the U.K. attempt to deflect the criticism by pointing out that other countries have poor children as well.

Ironic as well given the time of year and the age old story of The Christmas Carol.

Perhaps they would feel happier in the 19th century?

I don’t think they are comparing the poverty in other countries to excuse our own government. They are just trying to point out to those who think that only our government has got it wrong, that it is a far more widespread problem across Europe and the rest of the world.

Communism is supposed to share out the wealth evenly. If I thought that Communism worked, I would vote Communist but, we all know it does not work. We all know that after the Russian Revolution for example, the majority ended up as badly off as they were under the Romanovs. As for China, that is even worse.

I don’t pretend to have an answer but I think it is a human problem. I am not even sure there is an answer.

Tweedle24

I am no economist but, I do remember being told at school, back in the 50s, that when there is a welfare state, some will fall through the holes in the net. It seems to me that these days there are more holes than net.

Very true - a difference now is that a lot of working people are also falling through the net.

I am no economist but, I do remember being told at school, back in the 50s, that when there is a welfare state, some will fall through the holes in the net. It seems to me that these days there are more holes than net.

Supermarkets are doing their bit Jaberwok.

fareshare.org.uk/getting-food/fareshare-go-support/

What really gets to me is the food that is wasted particularly by Supermarkets. Anyone who has seen the overflowing bins of barely out of date produce can only be aghast at the complete and utter waste. same with households again particularly after public holidays,Christmas being top of the league. I was a war baby of a widowed mother and one thing I was taught was to clear my plate as food was in short supply, expensive, and not to be wasted for any reason. Surely the supermarkets at least could put their perfectly good 'waste' to a better use than landfill?!

Anything that helps keep hungry kids fed is great. There are kids in need everywhere I didn't mean to imply the money was going to the wrong children. Just so sad and worry how bad will things get.

"Unicef has pledged a grant of £25,000 to the community project School Food Matters, which will use the money to supply 18,000 nutritious breakfasts to 25 schools over the two-week Christmas holidays and February half-term, feeding vulnerable children and families in Southwark, south London, who have been severely impacted by the coronavirus pandemic."

www.theguardian.com/society/2020/dec/16/unicef-feed-hungry-children-uk-first-time-history

That only works out to less than £1.50 per child, so presumably some money is coming from another source.

QuaintIrene

I hadn’t heard about this before speaking to my cousin today.
The aid has gone to children in Southwark ? All well and good.
What about children elsewhere ? London is not a country.

I assume it's because the grant has been given to "School Food Matters", which is a London-based charity. Presumably somebody in the charity applied for it. Charities in other areas need to do the same.

Southwark is such a deprived and overpopulated area. I used to work there and it was so sad.

So it's £25K for breakfast boxes for children in London?

I hadn’t heard about this before speaking to my cousin today.
The aid has gone to children in Southwark ? All well and good.
What about children elsewhere ? London is not a country.

JenniferEccles with regards to “truth”, everyones truth is different depending on their core beliefs and ideology.

How ever many counter arguments put forward in support of a personal position, it is difficult to change opposing views, conversely it’s likely to harden them.

Conservatives do not believe in government intervention to promote social and economic equality, but expect the free market to reward individuals according to talent and hard work.
Liberals tend to favour more government intervention in order to promote social and economic equality.

Clearly governments form social policy according to their political ideological position, and it is a political choice.

Notwithstanding the pandemic, which has made the situation worse, social policy, under a Tory government, has helped to greatly exacerbate social inequality, with its attendant social disadvantages in multiple ways.

I know I am prejudiced, but struggle to understand, even acknowledging entrenched beliefs, how we can justify the fact, that our fellow human beings struggle for basic necessities, dignity, and life chances which should be the right of everyone in our wealthy country, and not dependent on charity.

We are not by a long way all in this together, not even during this pandemic.

I think we’re all missing the key solution to food insecurity - eat the rich. It’s not just a peppy anarcho-communist slogan, it’s also a handy and sustainable way to ensure everyone had enough food!

Wait, that wouldn’t really work with social distancing...

lemongrove

I prefer to take a balanced look at things whitewave and won’t be drawn into trading insults with you on any thread.

You can call it balances all you want.

That doesn’t make it true.

Whitewavemark2

I am?

I was mentally excluding one or two posters

I am?

For information;

The largest provider of food banks, the Trussell Trust, had very few food banks 2005 -2006, 57 in 2009 -2010, and 1200+ in 2018 -2019

I realise that there are other providers but this is the largest one in the UK and the one I could find figures for.

I worked in a school in a deprived area from 2000 - 2013. We provided breakfasts from about 2005 on, but this was not necessarily because of parent poverty, it could equally have been because of parental inadequacy. But I don't think this adds anything to the discussion.

Poverty is, indeed, a global problem, but the causes of poverty are many and are not the same in every country.

The UK is a developed nation. It has no shortages of food; it also, apparently, until the current pandemic crisis, had very little shortage of jobs. In which case, it seems to me that the prime cause of poverty in the UK is the result of the economic system that we run, a system in which people are very poorly rewarded for working and wealth is, once again, being concentrated in the hands of few.

The poor are always with us because for centuries the economic and social systems in Western 'civilised' countries has ensured that they are.

No-one seems prepared to discuss this, though.