It amazes me how much packaging supermarkets and producers use for their food products. All of this hits the dustbin almost immediately furthering the problems with the planet’s environment.
On my first trip to the new Morrisons in York city centre, I was flabbergasted when I one banana packaged in cellophane with a polystyrene back!
A Banana already has its own packaging – why add more? Even if you do not view the environment as a concern, what a waste of time, money and resource.
I would like to see much tighter regulations on food packaging to avoid this unnecessary waste.
The Arclight centre is on Leeman Road, across the road from the national railway museum. Since becoming a Councillor, I wanted to find out more about what the centre does.
The centre is a hostel for the homeless who have links in York. Some residents are from York and the surrounding areas, some have lived here for a number of years and some have family here.
Last Sunday I volunteered here for the first time. Jim Banks, a joyful man with great sense of humour and confidence, greeted me.
Jim came originally from Bradford and has lived all over the world. He was cooking burgers, chips, gravy and beans for York’s homeless.
It was my job to flip the burgers into the buns and to wash up. I also served some food to the residents.
As a Councillor I obviously sit in meetings that approve large-scale programs to help people. However, very little of the time I get to see delivery or what many would consider as front line action.
This is why it was so rewarding to be doing something that you knew was making a difference now… not in the future, not may be later, but now.
The residents were polite, well mannered and cleaned up after themselves. I was surprised at the lack of bravado portrayed by the residents, which is sometimes symptomatic of some of their mannerisms in town.
I think therefore that those few who do act in this manner, do so not out of malice, but as a self-defence mechanism. If it were I, I had lost family, friends, a home and a job, lost everything - I too would put up a false barrier between society and myself. Society rejected me, so I would reject society.
In the Arclight centre it is not like that. The volunteers are embracing the residents as members of society, giving them courtesy and so returning the residents’ dignity. Therefore the barriers fall.
All of the people who pass through the Arclight centre are someone’s son or daughter, Mother or Father.
When it is spelled out like this and you are humbled, you realise that there should be no objection to centres such as the Arclight. If it were your child, would you not want somewhere for them to go? If it were you, would you like somewhere to go? Some people will say some of these individuals brought this upon themselves, drinking, and drug taking. That may be so, but people make mistakes, human beings are not perfect and everybody deserves a second chance.
Volunteering is one action that can be done to make a difference now. However more support is needed to happen at a higher level to reduce the dealing with homelessness and instead try and stop it from occurring in the first place.
I hope to volunteer again at Arclight and I hope others do so too.
I listened and read with interest David Cameron’s plans for the long-term unemployed. I was intrigued and concerned.
Many years ago, people who could not afford to continue living, ended up in the workhouse and working for a pittance for unscrupulous, exploitative bosses.
Being poor is not something to be ashamed of, a crime or a debt to society. Poor people need help, encouragement, even coercion, not punishment.
Under Cameron’s plans the long term unemployed would be required to carry out 12 months community service. This is more than criminals get (I agree they should get more). I would like to know how many Tories have been long term unemployed? I have previously been unemployed and on the dole for 3 months. It is depressing, demoralising and I was given no help or encouragement to find a job. I had just left University and many students have difficulty finding their first job.
Under Cameron’s proposals, the two-year limit on job seekers' allowance would apply to "continuous and cumulative periods of unemployment". Therefore if I am on the dole for 1 year and 9 months, demoralised, depressed, rejected and I do not have enough to pay my rent or find a job, I would have to mop up after people committing criminal damage. All of this due to intermittent short periods of unemployment in my life.
I am an educated, hard working, tax-paying individual, with much to contribute to the world of work. Having people like me doing this is a waste.
I want the unemployed to have jobs, to have dignity and be something they, their family and society can be proud of. I do not want to return to a society where everyone is supposed to “know their place” and aspiration is rare. We are talking about not the breaking of an underclass, but visually galvanising it. It sounds to me like David Cameron is just planning for the day when under the Tories unemployment reaches 3 million again.
David Cameron, Mr nice guy? Sounds more like a return of the workhouse.
Last week Hugh Bayley MP and I helped launch a political group that could spawn the future of politics in York and may be even the country. The group is called York Young Labour and is open to anyone in York aged 26 and younger who wants to become more involved with the Labour Party.
It is fantastic that we have so many young people getting involved in the local Labour party. I think we will very soon become a young political force to be reckoned with. What we have here are York’s politicians of the future. We have the traditional sense of Labour social justice but realise we live in a very new world with new challenges. Being the youngest member on the Council can be a lonely place and I hope that more young people will stand in the future.
Hugh Bayley said, "This is a new group started by young people in York who care about politics and want their voices to be heard by local and national politicians. It gives me a big boost to know that young people in York identify with the Labour Party and see the Labour government as doing most for young people on things like education, training and jobs."
The Chair is called Chris Buglass. He added, “This is for a group of young, like-minded individuals to come together in York, get to know each other, train, campaign and make York and the world a better place. If anyone wants to get involved you can e-mail us on yorkyl@hotmail.co.uk”.
York Young Labour’s aims include having speakers, social events, debates, training, campaigning and work experience.
For young people, it only costs £1 to join the Labour Party. If you would like to join, e-mail me, I want even mind paying your quid!!!
A few of us ended up in not so young reflex after the launch.
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