Dec 21 2008
Charity - virtue or Capitalist greed
‘Tis the season to be merry, and of good will. Walking through Manchester, you cannot escape the Christmas feeling, with lights along the streets, the market stalls outside the Town Hall and at Piccadilly Gardens, carol singers, and charity collectors.
In the UK, we have been rocked by the death of a young child whose whole life had been a catalogue of violent abuse, at the hands of the parents and a lodging friend. The child had been listed on the ‘at risk’ list, had been visited approximately 60 times by Haringey Social Services, and seen numerous times by doctors. After public outcry, especially as new regulations had come into place following the death several years ago in the same Haringey borough, heads finally rolled at the Council. All in all, a very sad state of affairs was exposed.
However, whilst the media searched for people to blame, childrens charities continued to run tv adverts asking for a monthly direct debit payment to protect the children of the UK. Gone have the appeals for a one-off donation, nowadays they want bank details and a set monthly contribution! A quick search on Yahoo! of the UK pages reveals a dozen charities all claiming to protect children in the UK, rather than children abroad. When ‘Baby P’, as the unfortunate child who died is referred to, was being tortured, abused and ultimately killed, where were these charities?
Yesterday, the news ran stories of problems within the charities of the UK, who, due to the recession, have seen donations down 13%, and by 20% from businesses. Shock horror, they may have to lay off staff.
When I was a child, charity was a genuine heart-felt matter; shops selling decent second-hand goods, staffed by unpaid, kindly old ladies, where contribution was rewarded by a cup of tea and a biscuit. When my mother died, we asked for contributions to the British Heart Foundation rather than flowers. I took the money collected to a shop, my mothers details taken down, and I was made to feel very good that such a sad event would benefit others.
Certainly, historically, Barnardos did a lot of good for orphans, Childline (a free phone facility for children) was a great idea, and the NSPCC has been helping children for decades. However, there are now so many charities, each requiring administration, that charity has taken on a completely capitalist element. The industry, and that is what it has now become, employs thousands (mostly call centre and admin) and has a turnover of millions of pounds per annum.
I once worked in sales for 6 weeks, cold calling businesses trying to get them to pay for a child help magazine to be issued to pupils of local schools. The magazine was certainly well written, giving help and support on issues such as bullying, ’stranger danger’ and drugs. A certain charity was supposed to have endorsed the product, as had the Greater Manchester Police, and received a pay-off for the use of its name. The sales company made enough money to send its top 30 salespeople on a weeks foreign holiday each year, to pay a decent weekly wage, and very healthy commission on each sale. I was disgusted by the arrogance and greed of the salespeople and the company. What was worse, the government could have issued this magazine to each school child for about £5million per year.
Charity has taken the responsibility off the shoulders of the government, who used to see a child as an investment in the future of the country. It has also become an impersonal giant industry, with credit card databases and no heart.
In the Eastlands area of Manchester, over 90% of children are living in poverty, and the kids loiter looking lost, with no facilities; the next lost generation. Where are the charities? Nowhere to be seen.
Some charities do achieve things for our needy children, but most just swallow up money. The government should make it much harder to establish charity status, should legislate to consolidate charities within each field (cancer charities are even more common), and start taking responsiblity for the welfare of the people.
Strangely, since coming to power in 1997, the New Labour government has promised to halve child poverty in the UK by 2010, and eradicate it by 2020. As pointed out earlier, the figure for Eastlands is over 90%, and 2010 is only twelve and a half months away. This is the same area that won the SuperCasino bid, before the government pulled the plug on that investment. This would have had a MetroLink, promised by Stephen Byers and Alistair Darling, then abandoned (though resurrected to connect the football ground to Piccadilly Station since Manchester Citys purchase by an Emirate investor). What has happened to the local Labour MP, Tony Lloyd, for such abject failure in reducing child poverty and raising investment; he is now Chair of the Parliamentary Labour Party! The sort of blood money that even Judas Iscariot hung himself for accepting, but no such noble a gesture from the Right Honourable Member.
