Loan Sharks

This will be brief. I don't feel well with flu like symptons.

I saw some more of the TV programme about living on the breadline, poverty families in the UK.

One family was giving away £82 per week to loan sharks, high interest lenders, because these sort of families would be unable to get loans from nornal financial institutions. My wife had cynically commented that the boys in the family were wearnig 'Bench t shirts' (a flash make I understand.) Well why shouldn't they I thought? Christmas is coming. Why shouldn't these children have the kind of presents I will buy for my grandson?

I'm sure this idea of mine must have been suggested before. 'Charity Loans.' A lot of us who can afford to do so give to charity, we never see the money again. We are quite happy to donate. But what about if we got the money back? Give our donation to the charity to pass on as a loan to deserving causes. Receive the money back as a long term investment at a very low interest rate, lower probably than the inflation rate. More of us may be willing to donate greater amounts, safe in the knowledge that at least we would see our money again.

The UK Government & The Poverty Tra

On UK television last night was part two of a programme were celebrities spend a week with the poorer and most inadequate families in UK society. We are of course a society that feeds of celebrity so average dim viewer takes delight in seeing a Spice Girl and the rest slumming it for a week. Why the programmes makers couldn’t have just made an ordinary documentary about these unfortunate people I don’t understand. Well I do; I’m not completely naïve. It wouldn’t have sold any advertising time and their revenues would have gone down.

But that’s not what I wanted to say. There were two teenage boys in the programme aged about eighteen. Neither is in work. One was on probation for various crimes such as stealing cars, the other stayed in bed for most of his days. Both were receiving monetary benefits, 45pounds sterling was the figure I heard. Both were living at home with their mothers. But, wait for it, neither could really motivate themselves to go and pick up the benefit!

On an earlier blog I wrote about a boy I know in Cardiff who has finished his degree with a 2.1 in Engineering and is unable to find work. He was refused benefit because he is living with my daughter. I know him to be motivated and wanting work. Since finishing at university he has had a succession of temporary jobs found for him by an agency but nothing permanent yet.

It does seem that allowing those in poverty to live with the giving of benefits only creates a society where people will continue to live as sloth’s.

Of course benefits are a necessity in a society for the care of our children, the incapacitated and the elderly.

But the dishing out of money to a physically able person, capable of working is tantamount to an insult. I’m inclined to believe that a government wants these people to exist at a subsistence level, never able to better themselves and so be a challenge to the ruling classes.

New Bob Dylan CD, ‘Christmas in the Heart’

On the 13^th of October a CD slipped into the records shops without the usual pre-publicity and fanfare that a release from a major recording artist receives. And like him or not, Dylan is one of the most important songwriters of the 20^th century.

This CD titled ‘Christmas inthe Heart’ is an album of Christmas songs. Songs performed by Dylan on this new album include, “Here Comes Santa Claus,” “Winter Wonderland,” “Little Drummer Boy,” “Little Town of Bethlehem” and “Must Be Santa.” (My Dad would get out Nina and Frederick’s ‘Little Drummer Boy’ and play it all over Christmas as a rite.)

As a lover of much of Dylan’s work I don’t know quite what to say about snippets of the album that I’ve heard. Pioneer Press wrote:-

‘Dylan sounds as if he just closed down the bars in Bethlehem with the Three Wise Men and then smoked some frankincense and myrrh as a nightcap.’

See http://www.twincities.com/topstories/ci_13564154?nclick_check=1

Dylan has surprised his audience at times in his career. The other day I was watching the DVD ‘The Other Side of the Mirror’ which is film of Dylan’s performances at the Newport Folk Festival from 1963 to 1965.

In 1963 Dylan is seated on a small stage in front of a few hundred people singing ‘North Country Blues.’ Folkies on the stage appreciating the good old boy. In 1964 on a slightly larger stage he performs ‘Mr Tambourine Man.’ On the stage is a somewhat puzzled Pete Seeger, but Dylan receives a standing ovation. In 1965 playing an electric guitar with an electric band, unheard of at a folk festival, he performs his classic ‘Like A Rolling Stone’ to a huge crowd under the lights. He is booed. He leaves the stage. The compere asks the crowd if they want more, ‘Dylan will come back with his acoustic guitar’ he promises. The crowd cheer.

After this Dylan then went onto to tour the world during 1966. He was booed at all his concerts when he played the electric half with The Band. Of course these recordings are now classic and every Dylan fan wishes they had been there.

He changed style again in 1969 and he became a redneck country boy with the album ‘Nashville Skyline’ and in 1970 released his grossly underestimated album of covers, ‘Self Portrait’.

For me he reached his peak in 1974/75 culminating with the album ‘Desire’. There have been moments after that, outstanding songs such as ‘Series of Dreams,’ ‘Brownsville Girl’ and Dark Eyes.’

And now this, the shock of a CD of Christmas Songs.

Some years ago there was an American TV series, ‘Taxi.’ The wonderful actor Christopher Lloyd ( Doc in ‘Back To The Future’) played the part of a stoned taxi driver the Reverend Jim Ignatowski. One day Jim wanders into the deserted garage for the taxis. There is a radio playing organ fairground music. Jim looks at it, switches it of and says, ‘You never know what Dylan’s gonna do next.’

How true.

All proceeds from ‘Christmas in the Heart’ will go to feeding the homeless in

whichever country it is sold in. This will be for perpetuity. Personally I would rather give it straight to the charity; but there are fanatics, such as my sister, who will buy anything the man releases.

My novels ‘To The End Of Love’ and ‘Learning To Wave by

Glyn Pope

Are available from http://www.turnermaxwellbooks.com/

Care in our Society – Gina’s view.

Quite a lot of hits to this blog have come from the Leonard Cohen Forum. (www.leonardcohenforum.com)

And within the thread there have been responses to this blog about neglected children. See http://www.leonardcohenforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=18911

Evie B asked: "My only question is do you know how does the Charity become involved in making it better for these neglected children?”

There were no responses to this question when I posed it in my blog. I watched an NSPCC advertisement on the television the other day. Very moving, the director is very clever in the creation of images but nowhere does it tell us what they do. I can see that they would be a first line of approach. A person aware that a child may be being abused would think about contacting the NSPCC rather than the Social Services as the line of contact is more direct.

In the thread GinaD wrote “A lot of good can be accomplished just by making people more aware of a situation, and, by so doing, redefine the parameters of what is and is not, abuse. It really does take a village to raise a child and that village's public, group definition of what is and is not acceptable parental behaviour can and does change behaviour.”

Of course Gina is correct. Advertisements such as the ones for Neglected Child and the NSPCC make us very aware.

Gina’s second point - “It really does take a village to raise a child and that village's public, group definition of what is and is not acceptable parental behaviour can and does change behaviour.” is far more difficult to address. Often those who live in neglect survive in areas that aren’t cared for; inner cities, virtually ghettos. Shown on UK television last night there was a programme where a number of celebrities lived ‘on the breadline.’ I hate this type of programme. Why not just show poverty as it is. But I watched. I don’t believe the celebrities will continue to care once they have moved back to their ‘mansions’. But seeing inside these humans housed in 21^st century Britain was an eye-opener. Poverty is rife in Britain. And the people here were trapped in their poverty. It was just the sink, the bottom of the pile. Nobody would choose to live there. Gina’s views that it takes a village to raise a child are very noble. But these places are too far gone and until governments prioritise how public money is spent there will be no real solution.

Evie’s Question

I post my new blogs on various forums, one of which is the Leonard Cohen Forum.

(As an aside, most of my hits come from here – I don’t know why.)

On the Cohen forum Evie posted the following reply, referring to the blog of

THURSDAY, 15 OCTOBER 2009

Memories Of A Neglected Child

Evie wrote:

‘I have seen the TV ads and feel this is a really worthy cause.
My only question is do you know how does the Charity’ (Action For Children) ‘becomes involved in making it better for these neglected children?
Kindest
Evie B’

To be honest I’ve often wondered myself. With charities such as Oxfam and Action Aid how they use the donations is obvious; front line providing food and water and then longer term farming projects. Adverts for animal charities in the UK show the care and attention that is given to animals that have been cruelly treated or abandoned; vet care and animal sanctuaries. But with children charities such as the NSPCC and Action for Children the advertisements don’t say how are donations are used. Evie goes onto say,

‘How do they’ (the Charities) ‘become involved? Maybe as a follow up to, say, a teacher contacting Social Services? I am just trying to understand how they step in and help.’

I should stress that there is no suggestion on Evie’s or my part that the money donated is misused. Absolutely not.

Looking at the main website http://www.actionforchildren.org.uk/

there is nothing about the action they take to help children.

I believe the charity would benefit further by telling us.

Memories Of A Neglected Child

Studies suggest up to 10% of our children experience neglect in some form or other - that's almost 1.5 million children. No child should be neglected. With your help, Action for Children can help children and families before problems get out of hand

http://www.actionforchildren.org.uk/

I taught in a pleasant seaside town. The catchment area ranged from the very well off to the less so but most I would say were comfortable with their income. Certainly there were no poorer families who could not afford to clothe and feed their children.

One morning a boy aged about fourteen turned up to my class. Call him John. John had forgotten assembly, which was by then going on, and thought that I was due to teach him first lesson that day. I wasn’t but as he had no timetable, pen and everything else that a child needs to function in school it was hardly surprising. John didn’t really know where he was.

It had rained all night. It was a cold late November morning with a biting wind. John was wearing jeans and as a gesture towards school uniform a white shirt. A scruffy white shirt with buttons missing. John’s feet were soaking. Well yours would be if you’d come to school in the wet wearing old worn plimsolls with holes in them. John was hungry. I knew he was hungry. I could tell. And he hugged the heater in the room.

The Christmas Fayre was due. My tutor group had done very well in bringing in jumble that their families didn’t need, clothes they had grown out of, food that had been stuck at the back of the cupboard for months. I was supposed to send the stuff up a designated room each morning with a couple of runners but I’d forgotten that day.

I went into my stock cupboard. I found John a sweatshirt that someone had lost and a pair of Wellingtons. I offered them to him. John took them without any embarassment. Here was a boy who wasn’t given much. I asked him if was hungry. ‘Got up late. Didn’t have time for breakfast.’ I knew here he was lying. I found a packet of biscuits and the only tin I could open was sardines. John sat by the radiator and ate his breakfast picking up the sardines with his fingers, dipping the biscuits into the juice and drinking water from a mug. It was probably his evening meal from the day before as well. John finished and left the room as my class arrived. He thanked me and I knew he meant it. During the day John told every teacher who taught him how ‘great Mr Pope was’ – I knew because they told me. John was later taken into care.

Like I say this wasn’t a poor area but here was a neglected child. Add to that poverty and you have a situation like my sister-in-law taught in Leicester during the eighties and nineties. Many children who would arrive at school unfed, not properly dressed in the winter, even without shoes.

Studies suggest up to 10% of our children experience neglect in some form or other - that's almost 1.5 million children. No child should be neglected. With your help, Action for Children can help children and families before problems get out of hand.

http://www.actionforchildren.org.uk/

Writing is Hard Work

I had planned a completely different blog for today.

Even wrote it in my head at 4am on Sunday morning.

Then I had a whole lot of work to edit from my forthcoming novel that my editor had sent me.

After that I found out that I hadn't properly saved back the previous piece of editing and so had to do that all over gain.

And then to top it all I was set some homework to do.

Now I want to lie down whilst I wait for next few chapters to correct to arrive.

And of course I'm writing my new novel.

I will get back to writing my blogs proper, because I do enjoy producing them.