Letter: Food poverty exists in the UK (From Lancashire Telegraph)

We now have record numbers of food shops for our own poverty stricken with more being opened due to demand .
It is well overdue time to stop overseas aid and care for our own.

Even if all overseas aid was stopped there would still be problems of deprivation and relative poverty in this country. These problems are deeply rooted, structural and generational and existed before the onset of the recession which has served to reinforce and accentuate these problems. The real long term solution lies in growing the economy and ensuring that the benefits of this growth accrue to those living in deprived communities in terms of employment opportunities and educational opportunities to improve social mobility. With regards to more short term, day to day problems of food poverty the welfare system should provide a safety net, obviously at the moment with increasingly punitive sanctions it isn't providing this for as many people as it once was. Foreign aid has nothing to do with all this, it is not an either or situation.

I hope the people who voted for this coalition, spend a little time reflecting on the damage they have created. There will be a massive increase in poverty of all types in this country in the near future. People will not know what has hit them in the next 12 months. If you are renting your house and in reciept of housing benefit prepare to move , If you have a bedroom more than they decide you need your benefit will be reduced, the more spare rooms you have the benefit you will lose. It's like going back to Victorian times.

If you have more rooms than you need why should "benefits" be paying for it?
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Poverty is comparative.

It all depends on what you define as poverty. To be honest, I do not think anyone in this country is in, what I consider, to be poverty. Can anyone tell me where there is a shanty town in this country like you see in reports from the less affluent areas in Asia and Africa, where hundreds and thousands are living without clean water, and living in makeshift shacks of cardboard and corrugated sheeting?

Darwen Malc wrote:
It all depends on what you define as poverty. To be honest, I do not think anyone in this country is in, what I consider, to be poverty. Can anyone tell me where there is a shanty town in this country like you see in reports from the less affluent areas in Asia and Africa, where hundreds and thousands are living without clean water, and living in makeshift shacks of cardboard and corrugated sheeting?

To be honest i do not care about Africa or it,s people .It has had billions in aid and is no different now than it was 25 years ago or more . Their corrupt leaders make sure their pockets are lined with our ! money .

I think that when we are opening food centres in our own country and even if only one pensioner freezes to death here it is time to stop all aid and put the money into our own country.

BritainfortheBritish wrote:

Darwen Malc wrote: It all depends on what you define as poverty. To be honest, I do not think anyone in this country is in, what I consider, to be poverty. Can anyone tell me where there is a shanty town in this country like you see in reports from the less affluent areas in Asia and Africa, where hundreds and thousands are living without clean water, and living in makeshift shacks of cardboard and corrugated sheeting?

To be honest i do not care about Africa or it,s people .It has had billions in aid and is no different now than it was 25 years ago or more . Their corrupt leaders make sure their pockets are lined with our ! money . I think that when we are opening food centres in our own country and even if only one pensioner freezes to death here it is time to stop all aid and put the money into our own country.

Me, me, me ,me - what price the life of a few hundred thousand darkies in comparison to one British pensioner.

No not me me me but our our our ! Our pensioners have paid into this country all their lives some went to war.
They are being left to freeze through poverty and a government that send our ! money to Africa and other countries .

So yes ! i do think our own should come first and no i am not bothered about the deaths of thousands of Africans . They have had billions and a lot of years to get things right.

Maybe condoms would be better for them than our money.

BritainfortheBritish wrote:
No not me me me but our our our ! Our pensioners have paid into this country all their lives some went to war. They are being left to freeze through poverty and a government that send our ! money to Africa and other countries . So yes ! i do think our own should come first and no i am not bothered about the deaths of thousands of Africans . They have had billions and a lot of years to get things right. Maybe condoms would be better for them than our money.

Wow you would think that "the war" was won entirley on the efforts of white british soldiers!!
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What about the 100s of thousands of Commonwealth soldiers who died in the war. What about all the African countries that have been exploited by the multi national businesses that pay miners £10 a week so that we can benefit from cheap resources? Perhaps the workers in Africa would like to be able to "pay into their country".
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All these "pensioners" that have paid into this country - how many are left to freeze? how many live on the streets?
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Has it ever crossed your mind why the life expectancy in the UK is 80 (14th in the World) and the life expectancy in the bottom 50 countries (all African bar 1) is about 50? You don't get to be a pensioner in most African countries!