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Govt to tackle obesity..apparently

For balance, here's Jack Monroe:

https://cookingonabootstrap.com/2020/07/30/the-price-of-potatoes-and-the-value-of-compassion/

People who lecture the poor about how to live lack empathy and humanity.

Makes my blood boil to be honest (as you can probably tell).
Yes, definitely.

Some should try volunteering at a food bank in order to gain some perspective, perhaps my post about that got missed earlier...:D

Great quote from the link...

a plague of clockwork cockroaches, wound up and scurrying every which way into the light. Some are clumsily well-intentioned, most are not, yet here they come with their hastily-Googled prices of spring greens and potatoes, crowing about how! cheap! vegetables! are!
 
OK, that link is eye opening. This thread is about obesity, not poverty? I’m sure there is a link but that’s a whole different problem. My regular observations are spherical families waddling back to their expensive vehicles with a trolley full of absolute rubbish. These people are not poor, they just don’t eat a proper balanced diet.
 
OK, that link is eye opening. This thread is about obesity, not poverty? I’m sure there is a link but that’s a whole different problem. My regular observations are spherical families waddling back to their expensive vehicles with a trolley full of absolute rubbish. These people are not poor, they just don’t eat a proper balanced diet.
There are many reasons why people struggle to eat a balanced diet, not least the success of the food industry at addicting people to unhealthy ‘food’ and snacks.
 
OK, that link is eye opening. This thread is about obesity, not poverty? I’m sure there is a link but that’s a whole different problem. My regular observations are spherical families waddling back to their expensive vehicles with a trolley full of absolute rubbish. These people are not poor, they just don’t eat a proper balanced diet.
'You just...'
 
For balance, here's Jack Monroe:

https://cookingonabootstrap.com/2020/07/30/the-price-of-potatoes-and-the-value-of-compassion/

People who lecture the poor about how to live lack empathy and humanity.

Makes my blood boil to be honest (as you can probably tell).

Brilliant drood, thanks for the link.

“And if your response to people in crisis is to simply lecture paternalistically about how you would be better at being poor than they would, I suggest you put your money where your flapping great mouth is, and give it all away. To women refuges, child support services, food banks, and every other organisation trying to patch up the screaming great holes in the social security safety nets that millions of children are falling through. You may well know the price of potatoes, but in order to tackle food poverty on a real level, not just a pontification for a jolly brouhaha on the internet, you need to understand the value of compassion as well.”
 
It's also a lot about people who are 'time poor' as well as poor in the monetary sense. I'd like to think I'd have the time and inclination to cook myself reasonably healthy food if I suddenly lost all my money, but I'd be much less likely to do so if I had a full-time job and several children to feed as well.
 
It's also a lot about people who are 'time poor' as well as poor in the monetary sense. I'd like to think I'd have the time and inclination to cook myself reasonably healthy food if I suddenly lost all my money, but I'd be much less likely to do so if I had a full-time job and several children to feed as well.
Indeed. Sometimes people make bad choices because all the options they have are bad ones.
 
Seriously, how cheap do you think fresh food should be? Should the govt provide further subsidies for it?

Big part of the problem is that fresh food at the farm gate is cheap but loads of intermediaries make a living from getting it from gate to plate.

It's already heavily subsidised in most of the western world but Ms Mogg's 85p per kilo is around four times the price of a fresh potato.

I remember as a child taking land rover and trailer round town to deliver 56lb bags of potatoes every week, doesn't happen any more.
 
It's also a lot about people who are 'time poor' as well as poor in the monetary sense. I'd like to think I'd have the time and inclination to cook myself reasonably healthy food if I suddenly lost all my money, but I'd be much less likely to do so if I had a full-time job and several children to feed as well.
This is certainly true, and the vicious circle of poverty/poor diet/lack of drive to resolve the situation is hard to break. I've spent time living on benefits, for 2 years after my road accident I was unable to work. I know more than most here about living on benefits. I survived because I'm intelligent, resourceful and tough. These are the very qualities that make me useful to employers and mean that I *don't* have to remain on benefits. Not everybody has them. It's the same as smokers being generally the people who can least afford it. A 20 a day habit costs £10 a day, £3500 a year. That's more than I spend on my car. However if a cig is the only bloody escape you get from a grim life, then you're going to smoke.
 
This is certainly true, and the vicious circle of poverty/poor diet/lack of drive to resolve the situation is hard to break. I've spent time living on benefits, for 2 years after my road accident I was unable to work. I know more than most here about living on benefits. I survived because I'm intelligent, resourceful and tough. These are the very qualities that make me useful to employers and mean that I *don't* have to remain on benefits. Not everybody has them. It's the same as smokers being generally the people who can least afford it. A 20 a day habit costs £10 a day, £3500 a year. That's more than I spend on my car. However if a cig is the only bloody escape you get from a grim life, then you're going to smoke.

It takes an education to start with that is worthy of the name, it takes growing up in a positive environment, it takes outside support and of course, luck. There is more to overcoming poverty, poor diet and a lack of drive than being intelligent, resourceful and tough like you.

Get yourself down to a food bank. Don’t forget to check they have a can opener for the cans donated that need one and are able to boil water if needed. Oh, and something to eat with as well, shoving baked beans in with your hand isn’t great.

I think we probably have a different idea of poverty...
 
Another u-turn. I never really thought they would go through with it but very disappointed all the same.

Junk food: Ministers to delay ban on multi-buy deals

Source: BBC

There is no chance the ‘food’ and drink manufacturers will regulate their behaviour themselves, they should voluntarily stop addicting children to the garbage they call food. Profit before health is the motto of the industry and govt.
 
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The day any government tackles health issues will be a first.You don't even have unpolluted air to breathe.Health inequalities have been the same for 50yrs despite numerous reports etc
 
The day any government tackles health issues will be a first.You don't even have unpolluted air to breathe.Health inequalities have been the same for 50yrs despite numerous reports etc
The target is making the masses die quickly after retirement.
 


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