A member of the Branch has written to the Prime Minister on behalf of his daughter, about the high levels of poverty in the Camborne, Pool and Redruth area.
The letter is written in a private capacity by Rhisiart Tal-e-bot, who hi
ghlights the depravation that can be found in Camborne, Pool and Redruth area and challenges Prime Minister David Cameron to explain to his four year old daughter that these issues will take more than simple donations of food to be resolved.
In the expectation that little will be done to alleviate the poverty in the area by the current government, collection points for donations of food can be made at Tesco in Redruth, Camborne and Pool and all 17 Methodist Chapels in the Camborne-Redruth Circuit, Camborne Parish Church, in addition to several other places in the area. The full text of the letter can be found below.
David Cameron MP
Prime Minister
10 Downing Street
London
SW1A 2AA
21.08.11
Dear Prime Minister David Cameron
Poverty and Deprivation in Redruth and Camborne
I am writing this on behalf of my four year old daughter who is sitting next to me who is concerned about the high level of food poverty that is apparent in our community.
On the front cover of the last two editions of the Camborne and Redruth West Briton newspaper, a story has run about the poverty that exists in the area of Cornwall where we live. On reading the article to my wife and discussing the issues involved in front of our four year old daughter, she was eager for the article to be explained to her, because one of the featured stories involved a mum-to-be who had to visit a local food bank with her partner due to a severe lack of food. The article went on to say that the food bank was in such high demand recently that it was running very low on stock and could not remain open if further donations of food were not made by the public. My daughter understands to an extent that it is important to eat properly when pregnant, but she could not understand that the couple did not have enough to eat.
My daughter said that the story made her feel sad and she asked if we could do anything. We explained that we could take food to the food bank (which we subsequently did), but that the problems were much greater than that and could not be solved with simple donations of food. I am an active campaigner, involved in local politics, undertake a great deal of charity work and work in a college of further education in the area and I am all too aware of the poverty and deprivation that exists here.
In June 2011 a report announced that in one of the estates near where we live, childhood poverty affects 66% of households and in Cornwall as a whole 1 in 5 children under 16 years of age lives in poverty. These figures are distressing and a far cry from the Cornwall that wealthy tourists often like to visit like Rock and St Mawes. In the Redruth and Camborne areas of Cornwall we rarely see tourists and poverty is tangible. (Many people here cannot afford to take one holiday a year, let alone five of them).
When a further front page newspaper article in the West Britain came out this week showing two of the food bank volunteers smiling and surrounded by food that had been donated by people in the area - who had also been clearly effected by the news item - my daughter was under the impression that the problem had been solved. It was then that I decided to write to you in the hope that you could give her a better understanding of the depth of these issues by putting them into context and showing her that the gap between rich and poor is insurmountable and growing in our current political and economic climate and that if she would like to do anything about the situation in the future a complete system overhaul is necessary.
I wish you luck with the challenge that I have set, but then again I do not expect much hope of you ever acknowledging this letter, let alone responding to it. Even though I am writing this in a private capacity I do nevertheless intend to make the letter public for the sole purpose that some level of shame can be brought to bear on anyone who could possibly deny that these are pressing problems and do not need to be tackled as a matter of priority.
Yours sincerely
Rhisiart Tal-e-bot
(On behalf of Owen Champliaud Tal-e-bot)
CC Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg MP
Contact Rhisiart Tal-e-bot for follow up comment on this issue at the one of the contact below:
Email: Rhisiart.talebot@gmail.com
Tel: M: 0044(0)7787318666
