Tory MP blames food bank use on people not knowing how to cook or budge

DiamondLily

I wasn't trying to shift blame, she is suffering financially, more than she was, than a year ago. As are the rest of us.

Nurses and fire officers feel the same.

She chose to put herself out there, so it's inevitable that people will be discussing her.

As I said, other than the very wealthy, we are all feeling the pinch.

Which isn't good.?

Yes, DiamondLily

She will be working with others who are earning far less than her so they may well be wondering if she has given their situation a thought before she spoke.
They must be feeling the pinch even more.

Well, the papers have found out where she lives, what her house is like, and what it's worth, and the neighbours are calling her comments "outrageous".

She may well live to regret sticking her head above the parapet.

Exactly what the right wing want. Pitching person against person. Ignoring that she was asking Patel how people earning much less than she is are expected to cope. She used her own case as an example. If she sometimes struggles how do workers whose take home pay is 1000 pm less than hers cope?

It's like Lee Anderson and his Reclaim cronies making allegations against Jack Monroe. Ignore the causes of the cost of living crisis. Instead blame people who have no control over what is happening rather than hold to account the politicians who do.

She may well live to regret sticking her head above the parapet.

That's exactly what the government would like, isn't it? Punishment for being critical of them and showing empathy for their fellow citizens.

We've already had a little taste of the sort of flak she's probably getting, here on this thread. It will undoubtedly be much worse from other quarters.

Yep. Number 3 in Laurence W. Britten's description of the fourteen common characteristics of fascist regimes:

3. Identification of enemies/scape-goats as a unifying cause. The most significant common thread among these regimes was the use of scapegoating as a means to divert the people’s attention from other problems, to shift blame for failures, and to channel frustration in controlled directions.

MaizieD

Whitewavemark2

Think on this.

People keep referring to the 'fact' (except, I don't think it'a actually true now) that we're the 5th wealthiest country in the world.

Which may be true, but the actual 'fact' is that the wealth is extremely unevenly distributed. We make no effort to even try to redistribute the wealth, but revere the wealthy, defend their 'right' to hang on to as much of their 'wealth' as they possibly can, and demonise the poor for being poor.

This will only change when a large proportion of the electorate believes that all workers should get a fair share of the wealth they are creating and that we have a duty to look after those who are either seeking work, or are incapable of working and vote for parties that will act positively to enable redistribution. Not enough voters have those beliefs at the moment. I sometimes wonder if there ever will be enough to bring about change.

There was a thread on this very thing a while back - can’t remember if it was GN or MN. Most people who posted were of the opinion that the best way to redistribute wealth was to start from the bottom up and ban people from passing on any inheritance to their children.

Basically the idea was that any property a person acquired during their lifetime no matter how small, or how hard they had worked for it, should revert back to the state to be ‘redistributed’. The thread became a snipe fest between those who had had no opportunity to buy their own homes, and those who had modest means. It was an absolute text book example of how ‘divide and rule’ works. I think the problem is not that the electorate don’t have the beliefs you describe, I think it’s the fear that redistribution means that they will lose the fruits of their own labour.

On the issue of benefits, the average Joe has been conditioned by successive governments towards the simplistic view that the unemployed are feckless scroungers ‘sponging off our taxes’. Similarly those who are genuinely ill or disabled to the point where they cannot work, have to endure the seemingly endless press and media parading of benefit cheats who will inevitably be held up as an example of why more cuts are needed. It’s never pointed out that they are a tiny minority and disability benefit fraud is less than 1%. It’s never pointed out that many sick and disabled people have worked and paid their taxes before needing support. It’s never pointed out that benefit claimants themselves are tax payers. Because the notion of ‘my taxes pay for their benefits’ is a powerful one and it fits the narrative - divide and rule. While we’re fighting among ourselves the big fish are free to enjoy their wealth - that’s what needs to change if things are ever going to be different.

Read this back in 2021 by Kate Brady McKenna. Even more applicable today.
One of the vicious ironies of life is that the wealthier you are, the more economically you can live.

Yesterday I made very much soup, from two butternut squashes, a large pile of meh carrots, onion, ginger, peanut butter (no, really) and stock.

There was enough for five meals for two of us., and it probably cost about £4.

It is exactly the sort of cooking that people say people who use Foodbanks should do. "Oh, if you buy in bulk, and cook it and freeze it it's really cheap to make nutritious tasty meals".

But here's the thing.

There is a HUGE amount of privilege in being able to do that.

I was able to get to a cheap supermarket to get the squash, and the market for onions (because I have transport and can get to places where food is cheap and then carry it home).

I was able to use up leftover veg because I have somewhere to store it (because I'm not relying on a shared kitchen with other people who might find my stash of onions, not-quite-rotten carrots and vegetable stock cubes too tempting).

I was able to prepare the veg because I have good sharp knives and chopping boards (because I haven't been placed in a bedsit or hostel with just a table knife and fork).

I was able to take the time to prepare the veg (because I had the energy, having not been working long hours at something physically demanding, and not being in the midst of a flare up of pain or fatigue).

I was able to cook the stuff (because I have not only pans but also a really excellent Instant Pot).

I was able to turn the cooker on (because my gas and electricity meter don't need topping up because card meters always cost more than any other kind of payment, and are reserved for the customers who are likely to have most difficulties in paying).

I could cook five meals worth of soup (because I have a freezer, and am not worried about it breaking, or about the electricity cutting out (see above)).

I could risk the soup not working (because if it had gone wrong it would have been annoying but I would not have been in despair over the wasted food and I'd have just cooked something else).

I had the emotional energy to plan ahead (because I am not spending all my time being terrified of what I’m going to eat next or where I’m going to cook it).

So yeah, I made a lot of food for really very little money.

But another me, a me who has to rely on what the corner shop offers (and I will be very surprised indeed if there’s a corner shop anywhere selling butternut squash (or any other fresh veg) at all, let alone selling it for 79p); a me who can’t top up the electricity because someone in the household needs shoes; a me who lives in a bed and breakfast and only has a microwave; a me who can’t keep supplies of what the actual me thinks of as ‘essential’ (stock, seasonings, peanut butter); would not have been able to do this economical thing.

Check your privilege. Always.

If the Tories, and their cheerleaders, can set one group against each other, it suits them. It always has.

It really started during the coalition in 2010, but it's got worse now. I was doing benefits advocacy then, and they put the word out that all sick/disabled people were either/and fraudsters pretending or drunks/druggies.

All rubbish, but the right wing press ran with it.

Then it was single parents, followed by foreigners, and so it went on.

There are still fights all over the net, with one group resenting the other, and thinking others are getting more help than they are, and more than they deserve.?

Everyone should be fighting this crappy government, not each other.?

Couldn't agree more DiamondLily.

I've posted on here before but my adult daughter has a very severe disability and is included in unemployment statistics because she claims ESA and this is the same for other very severely disabled people and people who lack mental capacity who claim either ESA or UC. They wouldn't be able to work unless they had 1:1 or 2:1 support in all cases

No, I know. I used to help fill out the ESA/DLA/PIP/AA forms for people, and help with tribunal appeals.

But, it suited Iain Duncan Smith to say that approx 90% of disabled were "frauds" or and/or capable of working...?

DLA/PIP can be paid if working anyway, so they honed in on ESA. Then there were years of continual assessments/stress/appeals.?

They knew their statements weren't accurate, and so it proved to be, but it suited their purpose to make scapegoats.?

DiamondLily

No, I know. I used to help fill out the ESA/DLA/PIP/AA forms for people, and help with tribunal appeals.

But, it suited Iain Duncan Smith to say that approx 90% of disabled were "frauds" or and/or capable of working...?

DLA/PIP can be paid if working anyway, so they honed in on ESA. Then there were years of continual assessments/stress/appeals.?

They knew their statements weren't accurate, and so it proved to be, but it suited their purpose to make scapegoats.?

See my post upthread. Another perfect example of the divide and rule tactics employed by successive Tory governments. They set us against each other so we leave them alone and nothing changes.

DiamondLily

No, I know. I used to help fill out the ESA/DLA/PIP/AA forms for people, and help with tribunal appeals.

But, it suited Iain Duncan Smith to say that approx 90% of disabled were "frauds" or and/or capable of working...?

DLA/PIP can be paid if working anyway, so they honed in on ESA. Then there were years of continual assessments/stress/appeals.?

They knew their statements weren't accurate, and so it proved to be, but it suited their purpose to make scapegoats.?

I was involved with the campaign group WeAreSpartacus from 2012 - a year before the change from DLA to PIP. We were a major campaign group, making a significant contribution to the consultation on PIP. Not one single suggestion we made from the point of view of disabled people was taken on board. Not one single suggestion or criticism of any of the disabled charities and organisations - again made from the point of view of disabled people - was taken on board.

Iain Duncan Smith accused us of ‘teaching disabled people to commit fraud’ when we set up a website providing support for vulnerable people who couldn’t cope with the complicated application form for PIP. This was a benefit introduced to replace DLA, on the false premise that too many people could claim DLA for very little reason. In actual fact PIP was never designed to provide support for disabled people - even the most severely disabled. It was designed to save money - nothing more. It failed because of the success rate of expensive tribunals who overturned glaringly unfair decisions and wiped out any projected savings. It remains a very difficult benefit to claim, even for the most severely disabled and the assessment providers responsible for carrying out the medical assessment on which the DWP bases their decisions, employ NHS staff ranging from paramedics to general nurses, who don’t necessarily have the skills to recognise the effects of the conditions they’re meant to be assessing. They are also paid bonuses for the amount of assessments they carry out. There is very little understanding of the system of awarding disability benefits among the general population, unless people have been personally involved at some level, so it’s easy to misrepresent the facts to suit the agenda - hence the media campaign to brand all disabled people as fraudsters, to make it easier for the public to swallow the cuts made by the coalition government.

A measure of any society is the way in which it treats its’ sick, disabled and elderly. The track record of the Blair government and successive Tory governments since then is appalling. The present government is proposing to trawl 2 million UC claimants for possible fraud and error, and to give the DWP powers to arrest people and impose fines, regardless of whether they are legally guilty- and regardless of whether the ‘fraud’ was intentional, a mistake, or as a result of DWP error. It’s also proposing to limit PIP to those claiming UC - meaning that a benefit intended to be universal and to cover the cost of living with a disability, will now be subject to means testing and will wipe out the eligibility of thousands of people. Is this the way we want to treat the most vulnerable in society ? Food for thought before you put your X in the box.

Mollygo

Read this back in 2021 by Kate Brady McKenna. Even more applicable today.
One of the vicious ironies of life is that the wealthier you are, the more economically you can live.

Yesterday I made very much soup, from two butternut squashes, a large pile of meh carrots, onion, ginger, peanut butter (no, really) and stock.

There was enough for five meals for two of us., and it probably cost about £4.

It is exactly the sort of cooking that people say people who use Foodbanks should do. "Oh, if you buy in bulk, and cook it and freeze it it's really cheap to make nutritious tasty meals".

But here's the thing.

There is a HUGE amount of privilege in being able to do that.

I was able to get to a cheap supermarket to get the squash, and the market for onions (because I have transport and can get to places where food is cheap and then carry it home).

I was able to use up leftover veg because I have somewhere to store it (because I'm not relying on a shared kitchen with other people who might find my stash of onions, not-quite-rotten carrots and vegetable stock cubes too tempting).

I was able to prepare the veg because I have good sharp knives and chopping boards (because I haven't been placed in a bedsit or hostel with just a table knife and fork).

I was able to take the time to prepare the veg (because I had the energy, having not been working long hours at something physically demanding, and not being in the midst of a flare up of pain or fatigue).

I was able to cook the stuff (because I have not only pans but also a really excellent Instant Pot).

I was able to turn the cooker on (because my gas and electricity meter don't need topping up because card meters always cost more than any other kind of payment, and are reserved for the customers who are likely to have most difficulties in paying).

I could cook five meals worth of soup (because I have a freezer, and am not worried about it breaking, or about the electricity cutting out (see above)).

I could risk the soup not working (because if it had gone wrong it would have been annoying but I would not have been in despair over the wasted food and I'd have just cooked something else).

I had the emotional energy to plan ahead (because I am not spending all my time being terrified of what I’m going to eat next or where I’m going to cook it).

So yeah, I made a lot of food for really very little money.

But another me, a me who has to rely on what the corner shop offers (and I will be very surprised indeed if there’s a corner shop anywhere selling butternut squash (or any other fresh veg) at all, let alone selling it for 79p); a me who can’t top up the electricity because someone in the household needs shoes; a me who lives in a bed and breakfast and only has a microwave; a me who can’t keep supplies of what the actual me thinks of as ‘essential’ (stock, seasonings, peanut butter); would not have been able to do this economical thing.

*Check your privilege. Always.*

Well put. I would add that someone on a sink estate won’t be able to source cheap nutritious ingredients because there are no shops anywhere near who stock them. People who don’t understand poverty often criticise those who live in poverty for relying on fast and junk food. If you live on an estate where that’s all that’s available what are you supposed to do ? With no car, and only the bus for transport you are limited to buying what you can carry - and that’s if you can afford the bus fare. People who haven’t lived it aren’t qualified to comment - especially over fed MP’s who exploit their expenses accounts and have no idea what it’s like to struggle.

Brilliant, Mollygo.

Spot on, Pammie1, and Mollygo- reality over rhetoric.

A Treasury minister has announced that there will be no uplift to UC payments.

Number 10 have said they are considering all options.

Parliament breaks for recess on Thursday, so nothing will happen.

There seems to be confusion about who should be saying what, because no one has a plan...?

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10845565/Treasury-says-Universal-Credit-uplift-not-going-return-No10-insists-options-open.html