Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Poverty in Ladywood

Ladywood has many qualities, but it also has "absolutely shocking levels of poverty", according to The Campaign to End Child Poverty. Those familiar with the constituency may not be shocked.

However, not even the biggest pessimist would have anticipated that "81% of Ladywood residents live in or on the brink of poverty". The BBC website features a video in which a local family of three describe how they live on a monthly income of £650 (why have a child, though??? Why not wait until things are looking up a bit?), while the Birmingham Mail points out that today 3,900,000 children in the UK live in, or close to, poverty. In the fifth richest country in the world, that is.

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