Hi everyone,

In light of the government's latest failing, I have been thinking about how difficult Christmas is going to be for the 4.2 million children who currently live in poverty in the uk and have decided to set up a just giving page to try and raise £500. This would feed up to 30 families of between 4-5 people per family a christmas meal. The extravagance and cost of a christmas dinner is unfortunately too much for some people and when parents are finding it difficult to generally put food on the table for their children, a christmas dinner is sometimes out of the question.

My hope is to get in contact with local primary and secondary schools around Manchester then they can identity who would need this. I also hope that some of the local supermarkets can donate food towards the dinner.

The UK has the sixth-largest national economy in the world, however 35% of all children living in Manchester currently live in poverty.

As Marcus Rashford says ‘These children matter’, so however you can help, please do. If you can’t donate, but you could share my post, tell your friends and family, or if you live in Manchester and could help to get things organised I would really appreciate it. I understand this is not just a problem in Manchester and it is affecting the whole of the UK, but I can’t travel round the country handing out turkeys to everyone (I live in tier 3).

Finally, to put into perspective exactly how callous the governments actions have been, I just want to highlight that the new HS2 high speed rail network is currently estimated to cost between £80.7 BILLION and £88.7 BILLION. The original costing for HS2 was between £30.9 billion and £36 billion, so if they can find an extra £50 BILLION for travel, there really is no excuse as to why they couldn't find the estimated £20 million to keep the school meal scheme running throughout half term.

Thank you so much for any help you can provide in spreading a little christmas joy!

All my love,

Tasha. x