Moving goal posts on poverty

I dare say I’ll have the “we lived in a cardboard box” jests but when it comes down to it, because I’ve experienced not having a fixed abode and the level of anguish and insecurity that brings, I say that you can get by without things that others may have, can feed your family without taking them to McDonald’s and maintain your dignity, providing you have a roof over your head.

I well remember after the war and at the age of seven and eight, because we did not have accommodation, I was shipped around from nan to grandma to living with mum whilst dad lived elsewhere.

I did not starve even under rationing and was washed and dressed in clothes which were bought with clothes rations and were therefore of a size which I was told “I would grow into”. I would move from school to school or not go to school dependent on the current situation.

I had little idea of the real trauma my parents were undergoing and it was only in later life I was told that they had deliberately kept this from me.

The only time I saw the veil lifted was, on one of the occasions we were kicked out of where we were renting, seeing my then pregnant mother in tears sitting on a chair in the street. Because of my experiences as a kid, when I became engaged, I made it a priority above all else, including nights out, that we get together enough cash for a deposit on a home.

The present furore about lack of affordable housing and each party blaming the other for not building enough is to my mind a red herring.

What I blame both parties for is not the failure to build homes, it is the watching from the sidelines and not intervening as the population soars and knowing that no matter what kind of plan is put into operation, the goal posts will continue to be moved.

Alan M Etheridge, Dudley