please empty your brain below
There is no point in just giving people handouts - all this does is encourage dependency and a culture of entitlement.
The real problem is that people don't have the skills to manage with what they have, or choose to spend their money on non-essentials (blame the consumerist world, or blame lack of self-discipline).
Give a person a fish and they will eat for a day. Teach a person to fish and they can feed themselves and their familes for life - and be able to pass on the skills to others.
Incidentally, I spend much less than £1 a day for each of us on food at this time of year. And the most productive of all my produce growing areas is the balcony. So, anyone can do it - it just takes some time and a lot of effort. Ah...
Blue Witch you've just identified a fantastic reason why nobody should rely on such patronising charity. Don't give people food - give them the money they need to buy the food they want. If welfare benefits don't go far enough (or are too generous)that's not the fault of the claimants.
Forcing companies who make millions/billions in profit responsible for paying their employees a living wage would be a good start - then people wouldn't need top-up 'benefits'.
I've said many times before that I believe strongly that the highest earning person in a company should be paid no more than twenty times the lowest paid. That would go an awfully long way towards alleviating 'poverty' in this country (and poverty is relative as anyone who has travelled the world beyond touristville will tell you).
I'm not getting into the whole 'welfare benefits' debate.
It's obscene the amount people spend on food, particularly in restaurants and fast food outlets.
Our household budget remained the same for ten years (no pay increases) until a return to the UK last year necessited a further 25% decrease in pay in order to have a job at all! I have found A Girl Called Jack's blog invaluable.
I thought the whole point of posting one's views on the internet was to get exposure; otherwise, why do it?
However, I can't help mentioning that a friend and I were passing a Jamie's restaurant a couple of nights ago, and saw about a food & music festival weekend coming up very soon, to be held at the Cotswolds farm that belongs to Alex James.
Advance-bookers can get a one day ticket for just £45 or a full weekend ticket (that's 2 days) for only £90!
I guess you'd get to see a whole lotta cooking going on, but presumably you'd have to pay more if you wanted to eat anything.
It's not hard to imagine it being a popular event: I, er... can't really imagine that too many people will be trying to save a bit of cash by taking along their own sandwiches :(
more expensive, no?
(and that's ignoring the taste - yuck)
It doesn't cost much to buy an extra bag of pasta or tin of tomatoes each time you shop, and it can make all the difference. Yes, people ought to be able to budget for themselves - but the reality is, not everybody can. I wish they could. But we don't live in an ideal world, and food banks are, sadly, necessary. And if you are lucky enough not to have to use one - why not donate to one occasionally?
The 'nutter on the internet' is not always a nice (or easy) person to have to get rid of, and there is often a lot goes on behind the scenes of popular blogs that the normal reader isn't aware of.
Some bloggers, having had bad experiences, choose to be more circumspect once they have overcome their foe.
Having seen that this particular "Jamie's" was offering bottles of "Jamie's Tomato Ketchup" at over four bleedin' quid per bottle, I should ******* think he could afford to give the odd 50p to charity.
I must admit I hadn't even looked at the website before you mentioned it, but the crowd photo it shows from a previous event indicates that him and Alex look likely to be receiving one helluva lot of forty-five poundses.
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