The Chronicle (UK)

What will your party do about poverty?

TO: Prospectiv­e Parliament­ary Candidates (PPC) and other local politician­s.

What will you and your party do about the extreme poverty that exists here in the North

East of England?

This plea comes from North East Humanists (NEH) with the support of some of the charities we have helped or worked with in the past. As humanists, we believe that we only live once so we want to make the best of our lives, and that our behaviour is guided by reason and empathy with concern for the welfare of all people and the entire planet.

It is not surprising, therefore, that NEH has, over the years, supported local charities which try to counteract the severe poverty here in the North East.

We have carried out a collection for Fareshare North East and donated to Crisis and the Comfrey project in Gateshead. We set up a scheme of awarding small grants to local charities which have similar values to ourselves. You will not be surprised to learn that many of these have relief of poverty as their prime purpose.

The question is, what as a

PPC or a local politician will you and your party do about the extreme poverty that exists here in the North East of England?

We are shocked that people in the North East of England are more likely to need help buying food than those living anywhere else in Britain; that in 2021, the North East overtook London in having the highest rate of child poverty in the country, having experience­d the UK’S steepest increases since 2014-15; and that almost two in five babies, children and young people across the North East (38%) are growing up in poverty – the large majority from working families – and the gap between the regional and UK child poverty average has reached a 20-year high.

North East Humanists want an answer to this question as do the other signatorie­s to this letter. We believe that the good work going on at a local level could, with some proper government­al support, put an end to poverty in the North

East.

JOHN SARGENT, Chair, North East Humanists; IAN STAMP, Trustee, Horden Community

Welfare FC; Dr GODFREY PASIRAYI, House of Mercy,

Middlesbro­ugh; A.R. PATERSON, Community Friendship Group, Stockton; LOUISE JONES, Support and Grow North East; DAVID WEATHERHEA­D (Director), Northumber­land Community Enterprise; MARTIN MCKEEVER, Felling Library; ELENI VENAKI (Director) The Comfrey Project CIO