Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

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Fishnut
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Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Fishnut » Wed Oct 21, 2020 11:19 pm

We know that the tories are c.nts, it's practically a tautology at this point. And we know they hate poor people in particular, so it's no surprise that the bill to provide free school meals was defeated, particularly as it was proposed by Labour with the intention of making the tories look like c.nts when they voted against it. But holy f.ck, how have we ended up with a parliamentary majority of people who think it's ok for kids to go hungry rather than spend £15/week to help feed them? I know that it goes against all the tory sensibilities of making people pull themselves up by their own bootstrap but if you're weak from hunger that's pretty f.cking difficult to do. I don't have kids (something I find myself increasingly relieved about as I watch people determined to destroy the planet just to see what happens) but even as someone who doesn't like kids I have enough humanity and empathy to want them to not be hungry.

I've emailed my MP, fat lot of difference it'll make (it's Liam Fox). I just feel so impotent. I'm constantly outraged by this government and there doesn't seem to be anything that can be done to stop them. They have no shame. They face no consequences - even if they get voted out they'll just get a cushy job somewhere else. They have no morality that I understand. They see politics as a game rather than something that affects the lives of everyone in this country (and beyond) and I can't even work out what they view as 'winning' as they have f.cked up everything and don't seem to care.

I feel like we're being deliberately ground down by endless chaos and confusion so that we're all too exhausted to fight back. But I need to fight back somehow, and I need it to be slightly more effective than sending emails to MPs in safe seats. I see people applauding Starmer for playing the long game and getting Johnson to say stuff he'll later regret but honestly that feels like too slow, too old-fashioned a tactic for the situation. So what can we do? How do we fight them? More importantly, how do we beat them? This can't go on.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by discovolante » Thu Oct 22, 2020 6:33 am

Fishnut wrote:
Wed Oct 21, 2020 11:19 pm
They face no consequences - even if they get voted out they'll just get a cushy job somewhere else.
This bit really really gets to me. It's not constructive but I really hate that they will come out of this fine whatever.

But as I say, it's not constructive...so I wonder whether the next few months could be used somehow. I still haven't got my head round all the details but it seems the Tories maybe see the tier system as a kind of divide and rule opportunity. However what they are actually doing is making a national issue lots of local ones, and I think it's probably easier to get involved in local politics than national ones, and people are probably more inclined to do so. So there is more scope for push back from a number of fronts. I'm probably being hugely optimistic here but this is just all I can see at the moment. Obviously harder to take action on behalf of your own community if it isn't affected (not that not being affected is a bad thing!) but there are ways and means and other areas can be supported too.

Having said that the news has just reminded me that Rishi Sunak is probably about to offer a sweetener of some kind so we'll see what happens with that I suppose. Got to keep an eye on Sunak if he succeeds in making things seem just about bearable while also persuading people that he can't do more than he already is.

As for the child poverty thing (oh, that little old thing), I really hope that having someone like Marcus Rashford on side (and front and centre) makes a difference and I hope he makes them regret giving him his MBE. I don't know what went on in the parliamentary debates yesterday but I get the impression several MPs were incredibly patronising about him and I hope that kind of attitude starts to come back to bite them now.

So yeah in short...as you say I think this needs to go beyond being clever in the commons.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by veravista » Thu Oct 22, 2020 7:22 am

Same here, it makes m mad. It's so penny pinching and almost cruel. There was a local community and church appeal in our village yesterday evening on Facebook where they are going to help feed the local school kids, so I posted that that was very laudable but how many times do we have to pick up the baton and do the work when our MP had just voted against any help? This morning my post was deleted. Of course my potted plant MP voted for not giving free meals, she only ever votes with the party.

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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Grumble » Thu Oct 22, 2020 7:44 am

I might be handing back my MBE about now, in his shoes.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by discovolante » Thu Oct 22, 2020 7:53 am

veravista wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 7:22 am
Same here, it makes m mad. It's so penny pinching and almost cruel. There was a local community and church appeal in our village yesterday evening on Facebook where they are going to help feed the local school kids, so I posted that that was very laudable but how many times do we have to pick up the baton and do the work when our MP had just voted against any help? This morning my post was deleted. Of course my potted plant MP voted for not giving free meals, she only ever votes with the party.
I think you can delete the 'almost' there.

These people don't see kids who need free school meals as having any future. You need to eat for your brain to function properly. If your brain doesn't function properly you can't learn or even think straight. That's a pretty basic biological fact that I think every single f.cking one of us can relate to every day when we realise we need to stop working and eat our lunch. But maybe tory MPs get such fancy breakfasts and lunches that they are never physically hungry. Or maybe as long as kids are getting their dinners during term time it doesn't matter if they go hungry during the holidays because child development outside school lessons isn't something poor families need trouble their silly little heads over? Or do kids get masses of homework over the holidays now anyway?

ETA sorry to hear about the Facebook group. There must be other people in the area who share your views, is there any way of finding out who they are (in addition to anyone you know already)?
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Bird on a Fire » Thu Oct 22, 2020 8:08 am

Grumble wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 7:44 am
I might be handing back my MBE about now, in his shoes.
Yes, it must be very disappointing to see the British Empire fail to live up to its historical reputation for ensuring hungry children get fed.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Bird on a Fire » Thu Oct 22, 2020 8:09 am

Some of the comments I've seen on this focus on the parents of those kids - "why don't they work harder?" being the main one.

Which doesn't seem to help the kids much. What are they supposed to do - get jobs and buy their own food?

More proof that people on the right are either stupid or c.nts if they can't join those dots.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Sciolus » Thu Oct 22, 2020 8:10 am

veravista wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 7:22 am
Same here, it makes m mad. It's so penny pinching and almost cruel. There was a local community and church appeal in our village yesterday evening on Facebook where they are going to help feed the local school kids, so I posted that that was very laudable but how many times do we have to pick up the baton and do the work when our MP had just voted against any help? This morning my post was deleted. Of course my potted plant MP voted for not giving free meals, she only ever votes with the party.
That's definitely a Hélder Câmara situation.

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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Vertigowooyay » Thu Oct 22, 2020 8:44 am

veravista wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 7:22 am
Same here, it makes m mad. It's so penny pinching and almost cruel. There was a local community and church appeal in our village yesterday evening on Facebook where they are going to help feed the local school kids, so I posted that that was very laudable but how many times do we have to pick up the baton and do the work when our MP had just voted against any help? This morning my post was deleted. Of course my potted plant MP voted for not giving free meals, she only ever votes with the party.
I don't know how many times we have to pick up the baton, but if we can at the moment, we have to. There's a half term coming up where children are going to go hungry . We can debate how appalling this government is later, we can talk about the political action needed to change things on a governmental level later. Right now, simple practical measures are needed so I donated to FareShare this morning: https://fareshare.org.uk/donate/?fbclid ... hsdWUY52QM.

Because for every absolute bastard on Twitter giving Marcus Rashford sh.t, every myopic little fascist whining that people shouldn’t have kids if they can’t feed them, every selfish tw.t banging on about what they think their tax shouldn’t be spent on, I think there’s 20 who, y’know, *don’t think children should starve*. And that's the immediate problem facing next week.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by El Pollo Diablo » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:03 am

I give to the Trussell Trust each month through Give As You Earn. I'd recommend it (or similar charities) for anyone else able to do so.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Vertigowooyay » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:21 am

El Pollo Diablo wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:03 am
I give to the Trussell Trust each month through Give As You Earn. I'd recommend it (or similar charities) for anyone else able to do so.
That's another good one - ta.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by bagpuss » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:36 am

There was some government dick* on the Today programme this morning (around 2 hrs 39 in if anyone wants to listen again). He said that the welfare system will deal with the issue. The interviewer asked the obvious question of why the welfare system would be able to do that in the school holidays when the availability of free school meals makes it clear that they don't believe it can during school term time. Unsurprisingly he didn't answer it, just waffled on about all the wondrous and myriad ways in which the government were already funding things to help (mostly the additional £20 on universal credit and that they were giving money to local authorities, presumably this will then enable them to blame the local authorities if kids still go hungry).

He then used the phrase "There are lots of ways that the government is trying to help those on low incomes and stand shoulder to shoulder** with them". Yeah, that's right, because lots of government ministers are standing shoulder to shoulder in the queues at foodbanks, aren't they? And people whose kids are on free school meals are often to be seen standing shoulder to shoulder with ministers in the queues at Pret? Dick.





*Kit Malthouse, I went back and checked. He was initially on to talk about the Coronavirus restrictions, as he's Crime & Policing Minister, but the interviewer went on to ask him about the free school meals vote.
**Surely a really bad idea at the moment? Sorry.

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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by bagpuss » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:39 am

Bird on a Fire wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 8:09 am
Some of the comments I've seen on this focus on the parents of those kids - "why don't they work harder?" being the main one.

Which doesn't seem to help the kids much. What are they supposed to do - get jobs and buy their own food?

More proof that people on the right are either stupid or c.nts if they can't join those dots.
It also ignores the fundamental fact that a lot of people struggling to feed their kids are already working full time but they're being paid such sh.tty wages that they still can't afford to pay all of their bills and still buy decent food for their kids and themselves.

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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Vertigowooyay » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:39 am

Quick look at the subsidized menu in the HoC for MPs...
menu.jpg
menu.jpg (66.93 KiB) Viewed 3364 times
No reason...
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by bagpuss » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:43 am

Vertigowooyay wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:21 am
El Pollo Diablo wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:03 am
I give to the Trussell Trust each month through Give As You Earn. I'd recommend it (or similar charities) for anyone else able to do so.
That's another good one - ta.
I donate every week through the Ocado "You Give We Give" scheme as they match every donation so the charities they support get twice what I contribute.

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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by JellyandJackson » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:47 am

In terms of the what to do, we’re in a position to be able to get some extra bits at each shop which I drop off at the local food bank donation point every few weeks. I am going to email my MP, for all the bl..dy good it’ll do, given she posted this. https://twitter.com/vickyford/status/12 ... 29?lang=en

Did anybody see Brendan Clarke-Smith’s little snippet on the news yesterday? Talking about nationalising children, and accusing Rashford of virtue signalling. Honestly. What planet is he on?
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Vertigowooyay » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:54 am

JellyandJackson wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:47 am
In terms of the what to do, we’re in a position to be able to get some extra bits at each shop which I drop off at the local food bank donation point every few weeks. I am going to email my MP, for all the bl..dy good it’ll do, given she posted this. https://twitter.com/vickyford/status/12 ... 29?lang=en

Did anybody see Brendan Clarke-Smith’s little snippet on the news yesterday? Talking about nationalising children, and accusing Rashford of virtue signalling. Honestly. What planet is he on?
I would urge anyone, when they see someone using the term 'virtue signalling' on any kind of social media, to issue a brief reminder that 'virtue signalling' is what terrible people call human decency, so they can pretend it's not them who has the problem when they look in the mirror.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by bagpuss » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:56 am

JellyandJackson wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:47 am
In terms of the what to do, we’re in a position to be able to get some extra bits at each shop which I drop off at the local food bank donation point every few weeks. I am going to email my MP, for all the bl..dy good it’ll do, given she posted this. https://twitter.com/vickyford/status/12 ... 29?lang=en

Did anybody see Brendan Clarke-Smith’s little snippet on the news yesterday? Talking about nationalising children, and accusing Rashford of virtue signalling. Honestly. What planet is he on?
I'm going to email my MP too but I honestly don't think he reads his emails and he's a complete Tory yes-man anyway. He certainly doesn't reply to any of them, or even get a member of his team to do it. He seems to spend most of his time posting video clips of himself to Twitter, thinly disguised as promoting local businesses or similar, or parading his cleverness in asking a question in the House.

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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by JellyandJackson » Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:59 am

Vertigowooyay wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:54 am
JellyandJackson wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:47 am
In terms of the what to do, we’re in a position to be able to get some extra bits at each shop which I drop off at the local food bank donation point every few weeks. I am going to email my MP, for all the bl..dy good it’ll do, given she posted this. https://twitter.com/vickyford/status/12 ... 29?lang=en

Did anybody see Brendan Clarke-Smith’s little snippet on the news yesterday? Talking about nationalising children, and accusing Rashford of virtue signalling. Honestly. What planet is he on?
I would urge anyone, when they see someone using the term 'virtue signalling' on any kind of social media, to issue a brief reminder that 'virtue signalling' is what terrible people call human decency, so they can pretend it's not them who has the problem when they look in the mirror.
This is an excellent point, thank you.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by discovolante » Thu Oct 22, 2020 10:09 am

I emailed my SNP MP this morning thanking him for his vote, asking him to continue his support with this and the other issues facing the regions etc. got a reply almost straight away, 'Independence is the answer!' was his cry. Haha well ok.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Gfamily » Thu Oct 22, 2020 10:09 am

Vertigowooyay wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:54 am
I would urge anyone, when they see someone using the term 'virtue signalling' on any kind of social media, to issue a brief reminder that 'virtue signalling' is what terrible people call human decency, so they can pretend it's not them who has the problem when they look in the mirror.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by El Pollo Diablo » Thu Oct 22, 2020 11:27 am

A very minor point to say that this was a motion, not a bill, and if it had passed it would've not had any legal effect, just political (the Govt would've caved if it'd've passed though).
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by EACLucifer » Thu Oct 22, 2020 12:44 pm

Vertigowooyay wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:54 am
JellyandJackson wrote:
Thu Oct 22, 2020 9:47 am
In terms of the what to do, we’re in a position to be able to get some extra bits at each shop which I drop off at the local food bank donation point every few weeks. I am going to email my MP, for all the bl..dy good it’ll do, given she posted this. https://twitter.com/vickyford/status/12 ... 29?lang=en

Did anybody see Brendan Clarke-Smith’s little snippet on the news yesterday? Talking about nationalising children, and accusing Rashford of virtue signalling. Honestly. What planet is he on?
I would urge anyone, when they see someone using the term 'virtue signalling' on any kind of social media, to issue a brief reminder that 'virtue signalling' is what terrible people call human decency, so they can pretend it's not them who has the problem when they look in the mirror.
It's annoying that the term is abused so liberally, because it would be nice to have a term for people trying to appear virtuous without actually being so - eg corporations with relatively poor attitudes to their own minority ethnic workers posting white text on black image files showing their supposed support of black lives matter - but what Rashford is doing here is straightforwardly being virtuous. Likewise, doing the right thing when people can see is better described as setting a good example. I wish we could have a term for the hollow version without it being dominated by a..eholes who hate compassion, but that's where we are at.

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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by Bird on a Fire » Thu Oct 22, 2020 12:57 pm

Yes, it seems that any useful term for calling out c.ntery is soon hijacked and attenuated by actual c.nts. See also the way that 'fake news' has gone from referring to 100% deliberately fabricated articles designed to support a particular agenda (normally a right-wing one, because right-wingers are thick) to being lobbed at any inconvenient story, not even just cases with misleading framing or bias but simply facts the complainer doesn't like.
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Re: Free school meals bill defeated - the final straw

Post by dyqik » Thu Oct 22, 2020 1:47 pm

Hypocrisy is always a useful term here though.

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