Shellshocked!

We have the biggest decline in living standards since records began  in 1956, and the highest tax burden since the 1940''s . Surging fuel and food prices Inflation approaching the highest  rate in 30 years. Think tanks that have revealed that around 1.3 million will be pushed into absolute poverty.

But meanwhile Transport Secretary Grant  Shapps has had the audacity  to suggest  the way poverty is presented can be 'somewhat misleading' when put to him that rising bills could push 400,000 more children into poverty as the Chancellor refused to raise benefits - which will rise at less than half inflation.Speaking on Sky News' Ridge on Sunday programme this morning  Shapps admitted that rising costs of living are "very substantial", but questioned estimates of how many people could be plunged into severe difficulty.  "I don't want to sort of get us lost in numbers here, but poverty is divided into both absolute and relative (poverty), and sometimes the way it's presented can be somewhat misleading to say the least," 

 

 

Grant Shapps has surpassed himself by making such  inappropriate and insulting comments. It seems he is more concerned with playing down the figures, rather than expressing the slightest concern for cold, hungry children and how they will  actually help people. It  appears that Grant Shapps when not masquerading as multi millionare marketer Michael Green  is in total denial about the level of poverty in this country. Like the rest of the Tory's  has absolutely no idea what is happening out there. They are deluded and entitled. This crisis will only get worse and they do nothing. Compared to Richie-Rich Sunak ad Shapps we are all impoverished.Even before the pandemic, around 4 million children were living in poverty across the UK, the charity Action for Children have noted, with their Director of policy, Imran Hussein. saying "The government is in denial over child poverty which continues to rise and threatens to torpedo its lagshop plans or lvelling up."

.https://www.actionforchildren.org.uk/media-centre/action-for-children-response-to-new-child-poverty-figures/

Anyway, the distinction between absolute poverty and relative poverty is probably an academic classification created by a group wanting to justify poverty. If you can't afford to eat or heat - that's fucking poverty in the 7th richest Economy in the World and at the end of the day in a civilised society no one should be in relative poverty.

The money is available to save people from hunger, the cold, the poverty, and the despair people are facing, it would only take a few keystrokes on a Bank of England kyboard to create it instantly. So why won't the government do it?

Well in 2019 the UN Special Rapporteur on Poverty Philip Alston in his damning condemnation of the Tory Party's callous approach to poverty stricken UK citizens stated that when faced with the facts Tory ministers just reverted to denial & manipulating the figures. It seems nothing has changed.

https://undocs.org/Home/Mobile?FinalSymbol=A%2FHRC%2F41%2F39%2FAdd.1&Language=E&DeviceType=Desktop&LangRequested=False

Be prepared for every Tory to now trot out the absolute/relative poverty line. It’s almost like they attend ‘Lie Class’ every morning and establish a new catchphrase for that week. Think they’re taking bets, behind toilet doors, as to who can use it the most.