{"id":6999,"date":"2020-12-03T00:06:07","date_gmt":"2020-12-03T00:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newmatilda.com\/?p=139247"},"modified":"2020-12-03T00:06:07","modified_gmt":"2020-12-03T00:06:07","slug":"john-pilger-on-britains-class-war-against-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2020\/12\/03\/john-pilger-on-britains-class-war-against-children\/","title":{"rendered":"John Pilger, On Britain\u2019s Class War Against Children"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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In this abridged article\npublished by the London Daily Mirror and based on his 1975 film, Smashing Kids\n1975<\/em>, John Pilger describes how class remains the most virulent disease in Britain,\nresulting in record levels of child poverty.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I first reported on child poverty in Britain, I was struck\nby the faces of children I spoke to, especially the eyes. They were different: watchful,\nfearful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Hackney,\nin 1975, I filmed Irene Brunsden\u2019s family. Irene told me she gave her two-year-old\na plate of cornflakes. \u201cShe doesn\u2019t tell me she\u2019s hungry, she just moans. When she\nmoans, I know something is wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow much\nmoney do you have in the house? I asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFive pence,\u201d she replied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A screen capture from Smashing Kids, a 1975 film by John Pilger. Pictured is Irene Brunsden and her child Rachel.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Irene said she might have to take up prostitution, \u201cfor the baby\u2019s sake\u201d. Her husband Jim, a truck driver who was unable to work because of illness, was next to her. It was as if they shared a private grief.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is what\npoverty does. In my experience, its damage is like the damage of war; it can last\na lifetime, spread to loved ones and contaminate the next generation. It stunts\nchildren, brings on a host of diseases and, as unemployed Harry Hopwood in Liverpool\ntold me, \u201cit\u2019s like being in prison\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This prison\nhas invisible walls. When I asked Harry\u2019s young daughter if she ever thought that\none day she would live a life like better-off children, she said unhesitatingly:\n\u201cNo\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What has\nchanged 45 years later? At least one member of an impoverished family is likely\nto have a job – a job that denies them a living wage. Incredibly, although poverty\nis more disguised, countless British children still go to bed hungry and are ruthlessly\ndenied opportunities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What has\nnot <\/em>changed is that poverty is the result of a disease that is still virulent\nyet rarely spoken about \u2013 class.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Study after\nstudy shows that the people who suffer and die early from the diseases of poverty\nbrought on by a poor diet, sub-standard housing and the priorities of the political\nelite and its hostile \u201cwelfare\u201d officials – are working people. In 2020, one in\nthree preschool British children suffers like this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In making my recent film, The Dirty War on the NHS<\/em>, it was clear to me that the savage cutbacks to the NHS and its privatisation by the Blair, Cameron, May and Johnson governments had devastated the vulnerable, including many NHS workers and their families. I interviewed one low-paid NHS worker who could not afford her rent and was forced, to sleep in churches or on the streets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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