Eating Before Heating...

[Baby_Sham]

I've just been listening to a phone-in on Radio 2 on 'eating before heating'.
Call me naive, but I had no idea things were *so* bad, and listening to how some people have to cope through the colder, winter months, has left me feeling both saddened and sickened.

A woman having to choose between feeding her three children, or keeping them warm... how did things get so bad and why are we in this situation? Why does the government not do something about it?

I just broke my heart listening to a lady phone in and break down in tears live on air, as she explained how she was forced to get into debt, using a payday lender to have the heating on.
More and more people are having to make a choice between 'eating or heating' and I just wondered if anyone on here has to make similar choices over the winter?

Surely change HAS to happen?

[Mamyalynne]

piggynose you can get a pay as you go mobile phone for a tenner from the supermarket

[ClaryS]

what I said about reducing steak and roast was not taken how it was intended. We both work full time and get working tax credit so I'm not rich and do know what its like to scrimp and save. I do regularly eat sausage, mince and pasta its some of our fav. food, I meant that the treats of steak, roast etc. would have to stop. My point was that whatever level you are at you can make economies I should know I've been right down there with a couple of pounds left in the bank and no savings and had to buy dripping like they had in the war and eat it on toast so don't presume I'm some little rich Madame who has never known poverty I was brought up in poverty no central heating, outside toilet, two up two down terrace for a family of 6. And OP your choice of best answer is vindictive and extremely childish and if you knew my personal circumstances would realise totally ludicrous as well lol!

[emmie]

clary, many people suffered those privations, sometimes we have to move forward. what we don't want is to be going backwards.

[ClaryS]

totally agree emmie I was just annoyed that it was assumed because I said people should grin and bare it, that I was privileged and out of touch with poverty today. BTW -it was only a couple of years ago I was living on dripping for a couple of weeks, not in the war, I'm not that old lol!

[emmie]

i would eat my shoes laces before eating dripping...

[sherrardk]

Some people cannot make any more economies. A couple of weeks of eating bread and dripping (which doesn't quite ring true to me as you always give yourself away) is not the same as the grinding, no-end-in-sight variety of poverty. When you have been poor for ages and then they try and make you poorer what can you give up - choice of food of heat.

[Kassee]

I wonder if anyone that is actually on income support or jobseekers thinks it is plenty of money. People often tell us that they are well off on hand-outs, but have they ever tried to live on this amount, year in year out. Sometimes there are no jobs, circumstances are different, where you live, how far from the shops, whether you need to catch buses etc. When your money runs out for the week, there is no more, no savings, no food in the cupboard. Life can put you into a situation where you have to claim benefits, and it can be near on impossible to break out of the downward spiral of poverty. You can get married, have children, have a mortgage, a nice house, husband clears off, cant pay mortgage, loose your job, loose your house and bingo, your children and bringing them up on benefits.

[Hypognosis]

So this is Great Britain. Our 'National Dish' is Roast Beef with all the trimmings and here we are discussing how 'average' people, on 'average incomes' simply cannot afford it and have to make do with eating the cuts that are so unappetising to look at that they have to be ground up into mince or sausages. How depressing is that, eh?

60-70 hours a week and still not making ends meet? If that's not a condemnation of the lousy wages we get paid in this country I don't know what is.

And yet people celebrated when Thatchler emasculated the Unions?

[DrFilth]

> How are people on the poverty line managing? <

the ones on the poverty line are hardly likely to have computers and be posting on here

[vakayu]

How true Kassee it is just as well we do not know what the future can bring as circumstances can change so quickly through no fault of our own,just have to be grateful what we have got or not as the case may be,as it is a very true saying,there is always someone worse off even though sometimes it is hard to believe that there is.

[DrFilth]

> piggynose
hc4361, not all phones cost an arm and a leg, i'm all ears, please tell me what i dont know, eg an affordable phone!!! no strings attached, no bs <

if you have an old unlocked phone take a look at lycmobile sims, they have some cracking deals starting from just £5 for free minutes , texts, internet etc

[DrFilth]

sorry that should be lycamobile

[ClaryS]

sherradk Do you actually know anyone who has said 'right I'm cold so no food for me tonight lets click up the heating shall we' or ' right I'm hungry lets turn the central heating off and all get under a blanket' which do you think would be the less detrimental to health? You may find it hard to believe I ate dripping ( ok hand up I admit it wasn't for a couple of weeks more like a couple of days) I find it hard to believe anyone would starve themselves or their families to keep warm. A lot of this is spin doctoring from the labour party who made a big stand the day before the energy companies announced a hike in prices that they would cap the prices should they get into power - wow! how well-timed was that ?

[sherrardk]

Yes - me.

[sunny-dave]

It costs me a magnificent £10 a month on a Tesco sim only contract - 600 minutes, unlimited texts and a bucket of interweb - that's about 33p a day which is hardly a sacking offence, however low your income.

[emmie]

kassee, been there, except chap dies, you lose your job, find yourself with no money. and no way to get out the trough to put one foot in front of the other, illness, stress of time spent nurturing caring for him, and you wonder how did you get there, bills piling up, not much money, illness strikes again, its not rosy, some just don't get how easy it can happen, and it can does happen to anyone.

[emmie]

DF, do you really think that, you said you were on your uppers before.
sometimes this is the only link for some to the outside world.

[ClaryS]

so sherradk did you decide to feed your family or turn up the heating?

[andres]

If any of you are E-on customers on the Stay-Warm contracts are you aware that this gas/electric service is being withdrawn?.

[sherrardk]

My self and my husband went without any substantial food for a quite a while (two to three months). We heated the kids room (the things were in with us). When you have no money and they put in key meters you can't chance your luck - you have to pay day by day for your electricity and gas. Until anyone has been that desperate you can never know just how low some people have to go (evicted, classified homeless, offered hostel accommodation, etc). It can happen to anyone in the blink of an eye. I became really ill, it was the worst time of my life.