Friday 14 December 2012

Priorities



Standards of child nutrition vary widely from country to country. Only this morning the news featured a country where a significant number of children arrive at school unfed, and only get fed during the school day because of the generosity of their teachers. A country where vitamin D deficiency is thought to affect 25% of children and clinical Rickets is on the increase.

So which poverty stricken third world country is it that can’t adequately feed it’s children? Both these stories were describing the situation in the UK. It could be far worse were it not for the fact that over one million children in the UK are entitled to free school meals. 

It was stated by the reporter that free school meals cost the taxpayer one billion pounds a year. Now I don’t know if what he said next originated with the news channel or from some government spokesman but it was stated that this sum was excessive and unaffordable.



What sort of a country whinges about the cost of feeding it’s children? What sort of people begrudge paying taxes to ensure children are adequately nourished? To put things in perspective the money spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars would pay the free school meals bill for 20 years.

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