Victorian England Brings Back Food Banks

reply to post by phyllida

Benefits system here is very remeniscent of the nazis propaganda campaign against any kind of state help just before WW2. They had posters showing disabled people begging and the slogan was `These people cost you money`.

Heres a couple of other headlines of how great it is up north




www.bbc.co.uk...

I`ll try and find the picture of the nazi poster hope things go well with the benefits agency.

And AE i think your right on that one lol.

reply to post by fenian8

your up north is down south to me but ive been there mosside the man u ground and the lowrie centre when i worked in madchester .

i phoned up a food bank yesterday after reading this thread in the morning talk about pillar to post eventually had to phone social services to ask about food parcel and they took my number to phone me back and i am still waiting .

lucky i do not need their help but i could going to phone back today and claim i am from a newspaper and ask the lazy social worker twats why they are not handing out food parcels

Canada has food banks. It's a good idea, I don't see what's so bad about it?

The food banks in UK have been operating for quite a few years now.

spartacus699
Canada has food banks. It's a good idea, I don't see what's so bad about it?

Well, it's a good idea if it means no one will starve but I think you might be missing the point.

sueloujo
The food banks in UK have been operating for quite a few years now.

Hi yes but my point was mainly the amount of new ones opening up in places you certainly wouldn't expect them to and I'm questioning the whole need for them. In this day and age it simply shouldn't be necessary and the fact that it is, is a tell-tale sign of the state of the nation and the desperate straights that some people find themselves in. We appear to be going backwards.
Food Banks
NHS in turmoil
Having to pay for treatment & prescriptions
Agency work so no-one has security of employment
Unable to find dentists
Up to 6 week waiting for a routine doctor's appointment
People on the streets
Women turning to prostitution
Charities unable to cope with demand

Apart from sticking children up chimneys or down mines, how far back do we have to go before all comes full circle and rights itself?

reply to post by phyllida


I agree with you there. I am appalled at how they are vilifying the common man and causing such separation. They are basically creating an underclass. It struck me when I first read about what the Chancellor wanted to do. Make them work community service. They are being treated like criminals..! This is what they do to inmates. Make them put on a jacket and clean the streets or litter pick or whatever. The vast majority of peeps on benefits really are stuck..! And you are right there are no jobs...

It is now being seen as a derogatory to be unemployed. They have completely bastardised the word. As with so many others. They always harp on about helping the people in poverty in other countries and how they should change it. But I don't understand why they do not sort out the poverty of their own people first..!!! Get your own country sorted out before trying to sort out another one..

Also I think that the MSM does not particularly like reporting on the poverty in the UK. It seems many peeps want to ignore the fact that our own people are in despair and at the end of their tethers as there is no work, prices just keep going up and now the unemployed are seen as dirty, scrounging thieves. It is horrendous and disgusting how our own people are being treated...

I do not think this can go on. Peeps are not taking this lightly. There will be a backlash I reckon. Probably quite a few riots too. And damn right...!!

Well I think many of us are feeling the crunch, sometimes I worry how myself can make it through the next couple of weeks. Things are so tight. But if I see anyone hungry I will feed them.. Where has the compassion for our fellow man gone...? The separation is incredibly saddening..

Have we hell moved on from the Dark Ages. We are still living in the 21st Century Dark Ages. Madness...!

S/F for thee... Nice OP

I've long felt that there is something fundamentally wrong with our societal structure, when we have to pay for almost everything (and none of it cheap) or face a very very long wait for basics like healthcare.

"Starter homes" should not cost £400 k, we should not have to rely on charities and food banks when it's possible to feed ourselves very well on not much money...if we have the money, that is...and none of us should be in the hell that is fuel poverty in a country with a climate like ours.

The gap is clearly widening, and I agree, there is nothing wrong with food banks at all. But when so many of us are struggling, there should be a solution that works on the sources of the things we need to make them affordable, and not force us to rely on handouts. We're in the profit machine of big business, who don't care a damn about our problems as long as we are forced to buy their product. We are in a fascist state, without a doubt, when the state and corporations are so closely intertwined. The government does not have our best interests at heart, and that won't change until we stop playing their game.

spartacus699
Canada has food banks. It's a good idea, I don't see what's so bad about it?

I'm not sure exactly what gripes you're referencing but the arguments that I've heard include the need for such a thing being considered outrageous. That argument (mostly frequently from what would be considered the left of the political spectrum) suggests that the very need for such a thing in England shows that the current system is not working as more and more families and individuals find they simply cannot afford even the basics despite any help they may qualify for. Another argument, this one more frequently from the right of the political spectrum, is that there is no genuine need (even to the extent that food banks are just props in the political game) and that being so the only real effect of this provision is that it enables people who don't really need the help to spend on other things (drugs etc.).

Perhaps a more considered or more extreme position is that such aid actually plays a part in 'Disguising the evil'. This comes with an acceptance of the first argument offered above in that there is a genuine need for such help but questioning the idea of providing such aid in order to expose the real problems behind the situation; that the focus on resolving the matter through charity can relegate cause to a frequently and/or easily ignored secondary position and in doing so results in contributing to the continuation of the underlying problem. Ugh, sorry... here's something which explains it a lot better: I'm sure there are other arguments about but those are the ones I've seen or heard crop up most frequently whenever the topic has been raised.

reply to post by JAK

is that there is no genuine need (even to the extent that food banks are just props in the political game) and that being so the only real effect of this provision is that it enables people who don't really need the help to spend on other things (drugs etc.)

Yikes I hadn't even thought of that but now you mention it, I do recall a few years ago, a neighbour where I used to live who was a drug addict, not heavy drugs but pills and such, and she regularly went to the church for food, or asked the local university chaplain, but she always had her drugs despite 3 hungry children hmmm now that is a conundrum!

reply to post by phyllida


Food banks are pretty common place now.
www.thenorthernecho.co.uk...

More and more people seem to be buying into the myth that those on benefits and low pay are lazy, idle good-for-nothings.
The demonization process has worked - whilst we sit back and accept tax evasion and avoidance that costs this country approximately £260billion per year we allow the government to target the most needy and vulnerable in our society.

We have the fifth largest economy in the world and the 28th best standard of living.

Food banks now.
The workhouse and debtors prisons tomorrow.

We're all in it together?
The biggest load of bollocks I've ever heard a politician speak, (and I've heard them spout quite a lot of verbal diarrhea over the years).
The wealthiest in our society are getting wealthier as the gap between the have and have not's widens.
The obsession with maintaining the obscene profit margins these corporations make continues unabated whilst this country regresses further towards a Victorianesque society.

Many people in the more affluent areas of this country really have no idea of how hard the austerity cuts, high unemployment and low wages etc are crippling large sections of the country.

The old schoolboy network / Oxbridge elite have a greater control of the civil service, government, judiciary, industry and banking, military, police etc than they have done since the 1800's.
They aren't suffering - in fact it couldn't be looking any better for them.
The very people whose policies have failed this country and whose avarice continues to bleed this country dry continue to live in the lap of luxury whilst those most affected by their failings face being increasingly victimised and marginalised as they rely on handouts just to exist.

Millions who are in work survive on subsistence level wages where life is a constant struggle simply to make ends meet.

I could go on, but what's the point? As long as there's X-Factor, Justin Bieber and a constant stream of mindless inane garbage who really gives a toss?

reply to post by fluff007

I do not think this can go on. Peeps are not taking this lightly. There will be a backlash I reckon. Probably quite a few riots too. And damn right...!!

Oh how I wish! Unfortunately, as I've stated earlier, in my humble and poor opinion this will never happen explicitly because of the poverty and lethargy created thereby. Is this a ploy? Is this part of the bigger picture? Hamstringing the working class so Governments can do as they wish with zero accountabillity and no backlash from a monged out public? Saddling the students with huge debts so they are unable to protest? Nullifying the Trade Unions and making them powerless?

reply to post by phyllida


I know I keep banging on about this, but food has a lot to do with it. All the crap they put in it...god knows what really...and what's in our water...we're heavily sedated. That's no joke. They know what they're doing, and it's called bread and circuses. Very old trick.

reply to post by fenian8


That is just very very sad indeed. We shouldn't have headlines like that. We are allegedly NOT a 3rd world country and by the same token I get the impression that if we were, we would survive a damn sight better with all the handouts and aid available. Previously named 3rd world countries are now faring better than us. India for example has some great health care and dentistry with people going there from the UK for goodness sake!! Friends of mine from europe once told me that the UK was called the "dustbin of Europe" gosh I wonder why?

Buzz words of the 21st century.....paedophile racist terrorist and unemployed

Nice to know I belong to such an elite crowd!

reply to post by phyllida


I would not be so sure it won't happen. If anything does kick off I reckon some of the riots may end up like the ones opposing Thatcher's poll tax.. Peeps will not go on like this. Especially in big cities. They are being constantly pushed further and further down the class chain. Something will snap.. !

the reason it's a good idea is because people end up storing food. And then it eventually gets close to expiration and if they have no place to send it then it gets thrown out. At least this way people know where they can recycle their old food where it's getting sent to families that need it.

spartacus699
Canada has food banks. It's a good idea, I don't see what's so bad about it?

Because when you pay taxes to fund a benefit system in the UK you don`t expect people in genuine need to have to go to food banks to make sure they and their family can eat!!!!

How can food banks in the western world ever be a good idea wether UK, Canada or Australia????

I always wonder - do these food banks actually check whether those claiming free food actually need it? Or is it just that with the iPhone costs, the new GTA game, paying for the 56" flat screen plasma TV, Sky, and a holiday, they could do with not having to pay for non essentials?

For the record, I am 47, single, rent my house, earn ~£7k a year. And own my own business as well as helping run a charity.

reply to post by AndyMayhew


We're almost in the same situation, and I'm wondering if that what makes us so careful about money and priorities. People automatically assume a lot of the time that business owners are at least comfortably off, but it's so far off the mark. I discovered that there is a food bank now in the town nearest where I live, which is one of the most affluent areas in the UK. I don't remember all the details of what you needed to get help from them, but one way to do it was to have a letter from your doctor, so yeah...I'm pretty sure that your doc wouldn't have a clue about how much you might spend on your phone contract, or the tv.

I'm not bitching...I wouldn't want my life any other way at all...it's just that there seems to be a confusion about priorities for some people. I won't be using the food bank, by the way.

pikestaff

agentblue
Uh..... What is "solicitor" slang for? It is such a vague term to describe an employment title. For all I know a solicitor is a Jehovah's Witness or a Mormon....

Maybe you should move out of the country and into a third world country.... Don't tell the gov't and keep getting your money but live dang good on what scraps they feed you.

I am sorry, it's the survivalist nature in me to think outside of the box when it comes to looking at economic collapse and making the best of it. I am sure I'd get bashed for even voicing this idea but it was fun and theoretical

edit on 1-10-2013 by agentblue because: (no reason given)

If you don't tell your government your moving out, and where you are going, you wont get your money!
Plus, your government may decide as you are moving out, you are no longer a citizen of that country, and are not 'entitled' to any money.

Unemployment is paid on a card now.... You report once a month in my state to a career center for 5 min and you are I your way. You could pay someone $50 to act like you and never have to go back stateside for the limit of your "benefit" funds. Not saying I'd do that but it's definitely feasible. Also if you are in a union with a hiring hall, you won't have to show up ever..... Just tell your union hall to leave you on the out of work list. Don't worry people, I work and and don't mooch off the system but even I can see the ways to exploit this situation. Just pointing out the elephant in the room.